Divergences
by Em Mindelan
Summary: There are two ways that this story can end, two different, diverging futures, two different worlds to be lived in. He can choose the woman he is with. Or he can choose the woman he loves. AU Season Three. COMPLETE.
1. 1 Choices

**WARNING - IF YOU DON'T WANT TO KNOW THE NAME OF VAUGHN'S WIFE, TURN BACK NOW.**   
  
Well, you know, it's not like I'm not busy enough with all the fics I'm working on right now.......I simply *have* to start another one, huh?   
  
This is a fic with a bit of a difference. I read a Star Trek fic a little while ago in this style, and really enjoyed it.  
  
Basically, we start with one situation, and one choice. Depending on the outcome of this one choice, we start to diverge into different worlds/lives/outcomes.  
  
Basically -   
  
1  
a b  
a)i) a)ii) b)i) b)ii)  
a)i)1 a)i)2 a)ii)1 a)ii)2 b)i)1 b)i)2 b)ii)1 b)ii)2  
  
I'm not entirely sure how many 'streams' this will result in - I've only got 1 and a) written so far, and that's what I'm putting up here tonight.  
  
**TITLE** - "Divergences"  
**SUMMARY** - "There are two ways that this story can end, two different, diverging futures, two different worlds to be lived in. He can choose the woman he is with. Or he can choose the woman he loves."  
**RATING** - PG, at very least - there's a swear word in this chapter!   
**SHIP** - S/V, V/L.  
**SPOILERS** - Set post-Telling, however the only spoiler I know of that's used is Vaughn's wife's name.

**DISCLAIMER** - They're not mine, they're all JJ's. I'm just borrowing them for a bit.  
  
**Divergences**  
  
_1._  
  
There are two ways that this story can end, two different, diverging futures, two different worlds to be lived in.  
  
He can choose the woman he is with.  
  
Or he can choose the woman he loves.  
  
His present.  
  
His past.  
  
But only one can be his future.  
  
This next phone call, the numbers he will dial on his cell as he sits the pier where he fell in love with his other half……his next phone call will determine the lives of three people.  
  
_Lauren or Sydney?_


	2. a Lauren

· * *  
_a) Lauren_  
  
"Laur?" He tries desperately to keep his voice even, trying not to betray the torment he feels.  
  
"Mike, where are you? I've been trying to call you for the past two hours."   
  
Her tone is frantic, worried…she does love him, he knows.  
  
He swallows, knowing that these words are perhaps even more important than his wedding vows.  
  
"I'm fine, sweetheart. I just….just needed some time to think, okay? But I'm fine. I'll be home soon."  
  
He can hear her sigh of relief over the phone, picture her beautiful features easing as she hears his words.  
  
He does love her. And he owes her more than he could ever say.  
  
"I love you, Lauren. You know that, don't you?"  
  
"I know, Mike. I love you too. Come home safely, please, love."  
  
And it is done.  
  
He has chosen the woman he married six months before, in a quiet wedding on a beach, sand in their feet and the sun on their backs.   
  
He has seen the pictures of his wedding, seen his smile below eyes tinged with a weary sadness…….but there is hope there as well. Hope for the future, hope for some sort of closure.  
  
Hope for happiness in his life even when his angel is dead, lost to him forever.   
  
There is hope in his eyes now, as he presses the 'end' button on his cell, knowing that this is where he stops loving Sydney Bristow. There is hope in his eyes because maybe now he can finally stop loving someone who he can't have, and finally give his wife everything she deserves.  
  
He owes Lauren more than he can possibly describe, or ever give back to her.  
  
If he saved Sydney after Danny's death, then surely Lauren saved him after Sydney's.  
  
He met her six months after Sydney died, nearly 18 months ago now. They were married a year later.   
  
A day after Sydney died, he was standing outside her house, kneeling in prayer to a God who he had abandoned many years before, knowing that she would return, full of hope that the woman who had survived so much before would return to him again just as she always did.  
  
A week after she died, Will was still in a coma, and Vaughn sat by his bed, thinking about Will and his injuries so he didn't have to think of her.  
  
A month after she died, he was going through half a bottle of whiskey a night, and the only reason he didn't make it through the other half was because most of the time he had cried himself to sleep because of the emptiness he felt, even with the alcohol to numb the pain.  
  
Three months after she died, he buried the burnt remains found in the ruins of her house, and another star went up on the wall at Langley. He couldn't bring himself to speak at her funeral, and so the job was left to her father.   
  
He knows now that the only thing more terrifying than seeing Jack Bristow point a gun at you is seeing Jack Bristow cry.  
  
Six months after she died, he was still working at the CIA, still coming in half-hung over in the mornings and still making sloppy mistakes that Eric managed to cover up most of the time.  
  
Six months after she died, he met his wife. She was pretty, he saw coldly, because no one had appealed to him since she had died, but he was still a man and men took notice of these sorts of things whether they wanted to or not.  
  
She was pretty, yes, but that's not the reason he fell in love with her.  
He fell in love with his wife because she saved him from himself, because she, once assigned as his partner, quite firmly told him-  
  
"Agent Vaughn, with all due respect – pull your head out of your ass and cut the bulls***."  
  
He remembers just blinking at her, feeling the anger build up inside him, the most incredible rage possible at this woman who had the nerve to possibly tell him to get over her….  
  
And then this woman, this fragile, blonde woman, said in a voice of steel, "Don't tell me I have no right to tell you that."  
  
"With all due respect, Agent Reed, you don't have any right to tell me that. Especially not on your first day on the job," he had replied harshly.  
  
"Oh?" And she had raised a single imperious eyebrow, and said, "Five years ago, I spent three years with my husband on a deep cover assignment investigating the European underworld. Two days, two days, Agent Vaughn, before we were to be extracted, he was executed in front of my eyes because of a dead drop gone wrong. I was lucky to get out of there alive myself."  
  
So, I guess what I'm trying to say, Mr. Vaughn, is that if you don't think I know what it's like to lose someone I loved…well, guess again. Don't ever think just because I'm blonde or young or beautiful that I haven't seen as much death as you have. Because, with all due respect, Agent Vaughn, you don't know me. Just as I don't know you. But I can see your bleary eyes, I can smell the alcohol on your breath and I know about the mistakes you've been making for the last six months. And you know why I can see those signs as well as I do? Because I was you, two years ago, Vaughn.   
  
So this is where I respectfully tell you to get your head out of your ass and pull yourself together. Because that's what I needed someone to tell me." And then she had walked away from him.  
  
He had been so shocked by her words, her sheer nerve in telling her boss to get his act together that he hadn't taken her words in until later that night, when he was about to open his newest bottle of whiskey.  
  
He closes his eyes and rests his head on the bench top, breathing heavily as he sees her angry speech earlier that day replay against his retinas. The words echo in his ears, and he can hear her cool soprano telling him to get his life back together.  
  
And he does.  
  
To this day he doesn't know why he had decided to do what she had nearly ordered him to do, why her words had sunk in where Eric's and Jack's had failed.  
  
He thinks it's because in her eyes he could see the pain he felt reflected back, and seeing the pain still there in her eyes reassured him that starting to live again would not be a betrayal of her, that starting to live again would not mean he would start forgetting her.  
  
And so he chose not to open the bottle that night, and he chose life, and two months later, eight months after she died, he finally worked up enough courage to ask Lauren to dinner.  
  
He chooses his wife in the knowledge that she saved him from his grief and pain and he owes her more than he can ever repay.  
  
He chooses his wife in the knowledge that she does love him, and he does love her, and they were happy together, before his ghosts came back to haunt him.  
  
He chooses his wife in this reality.  
  
  
  
  
  
Now, before all the S/V shippers jump on me, be safe and sure in the knowledge that this is just **one** possible outcome. And from this, there are at least two different futures streaming off from this.  
  
Now, do you want to see b), where he chooses Sydney next, or do you want to follow the stream to it's end?  
  
Hopefully updates on this one will be reasonably frequent - I hope.  
  
:)  
Em [feedback is, you know, really, really, really, really nice...*pleads*]

      Plus, the **more reviews, the fastest I write the next chapter. :)**


	3. a i Fulfillment?

* * *

_Previously – _

****

**He chooses his wife, in this reality.**

****

_But are they happy? Or do they fail in the end?_

* * *

_a)_i__) Fulfillment? __

He resigns from the CIA a week after he makes the phone call to Lauren. She goes on desk duty two months later, when the doctor tells her that she's a month pregnant.

She's an analyst now, and rising rapidly up the ranks of the CIA, just as he once had.

He's proud of her, but a corner of his mind tells him that it could have been him, the CIA's brightest rising star….before he met Sydney Bristow. He keeps his twinges of jealousy under wraps most of the time, anyway.

He's got a successful career as well, after all. He's a lawyer, and he's about to make partner at his firm. It pays well, and he even enjoys his work some of the time. But most of all, it's _normal_. 

  
He works 9-5 most days, more some of the time, and a little on weekends. But he's home by 8, at the very latest, each night, to a beautiful wife and a happy home.

They live near the beach where they were married, a little way out of LA. It's a bit of a commute for both of them, but the beauty of their neighbourhood more than makes up for it.

Their first child is a daughter, a beautiful little thing with Lauren's blonde hair and Vaughn's brilliant green eyes. They both dote on her, but she's Vaughn's little princess and her daddy's special little girl.

They take her to the park on weekends, and it is there that he and Lauren watch her on the carousel, swinging around squealing at the top of her lungs.

It is there, on a day a little after Meg's second birthday [she was named Margaret for Lauren's favourite aunt, but it's a bit of a mouthful for such a little girl], that Lauren tells Vaughn that she thinks she might be pregnant again.

Eight months later, Lauren gives birth to William, an infant with the strongest lungs Vaughn's ever heard.

He's happy, and some days he barely even thinks about the woman he gave up.

It is four years after the call from the pier, and he's almost forgotten about Sydney [_nearly_], when he gets a phone call from Weiss about her. 

"Mike, it's Eric. I'm calling about Sydney – I wasn't sure if you'd heard yet."

* * *

_In one world, his best friend brings him sorrow and grief and overwhelming guilt. _

_In another, he brings him regret and loss, but maybe, just maybe, hope for her future happiness as well - and freedom from guilt._

* * *


	4. a i 1 Guilt

* * *

_In one world, his best friend brings him sorrow and grief and overwhelming guilt. _

_In another, he brings him regret and loss, but maybe, just maybe, hope for her future happiness as well - and freedom from guilt._

* * *

_a)i_)1 - Guilt__

His voice is filled with grief, and his words clipped as he explains what the woman Vaughn loved [_once and maybe forever_] had been up to for the last four years.

"Mike….after you went back to Lauren, Syd took it bad. Real bad."

Vaughn's silent, standing as still as any statue carved, not knowing where Weiss is going with this line of conversation, but not liking the sound of it anyway.

"She started taking on the most risky assignments, the most dangerous jobs…I suppose it's a miracle she lasted this long, I guess. It was like she _wanted to die, you know?"_

He represses a bitter chuckle. Oh, yes, he knows well. He had tried to get Jack and Kendall to give _him_ the most dangerous missions in the months following her death…..only when they refused to give him any more did he turn to the bottle. 

Oh, yes, Michael Vaughn knows what it is like to want to die because your heart has been ripped out of your chest….and because life doesn't seem like it's worth living.

"She's dead, isn't she." 

It sounds like a question, but it's not, because Michael Vaughn still knows Sydney Bristow, even six years after she became dead to him in every way that mattered. And he has a sinking feeling, a gnawing pain in his stomach which makes him think that he knows what she's done.

"Yes….we retrieved her body today. It's her, Vaughn. No doubt about it. The bastards shot her in the chest more times than we could count…..but her head…her head was identifiable. It's her. It's definitely her."

"Who was it?" All he wants is a name, because there is still a part of him that wants to hunt down the men who killed her to the end of the earth…..but that part of him has been muted by age and responsibilities and oaths and vows to love, _till death do us part…_

"We're not sure yet. She's been on a deep-cover assignment for nearly four and a half years now, doubling for us and Sark. She was working her way inside Sark's organization through becoming his lover."

Vaughn remembers Sark, remembers the way she told him about his arrogance, his ruthlessness……remembers the way in which she hated him almost as much as she hated Sloane.

He can't comprehend a Sydney Bristow who would sell her soul, sell her body – not even for her country. Not to Sark.

[_This is what you made her_.]

"We think Sark intercepted a communiqué which made mention of information only he and Sydney could have known. We'll know more soon though."

"Look, Mike, for what it's worth, I'm sorry."

Eric continues to speak, but Vaughn doesn't hear the words, can't hear anything except the sound of his own heart beating again his chest, can't feel anything except the weight of his crushing guilt pressing down on him.

He has driven her to this, he knows. He chose Lauren, and she chose the lies and constant deceit that he pulled her out of once upon a time….she chose death, in the end.

She would never have accepted such an assignment if he hadn't made the choices that he had.

But now she is dead, now, finally, no more last-minute reprieves….and he is numb.

He drops the phone to the floor, and watches it clatter to the ground absently.

He's killed men before, in cold blood and in the fury of hand to hand combat. Sometimes he still sees the faces of the men he's killed in his dreams.

But he knows that hers will be the face that he sees first as he wakes, and last before he sleeps, every night for the rest of his life.

Because he will have her blood, her death, her overwhelming despair that drove her to Sark…….he will have all this, plus the guilt he can feel even now crashing upon him, for the rest of his life. 

[_because__ he knows that she would be alive now in his arms if he had made  called eight different numbers six years ago]_


	5. a i 2 Regret

**Thanks for the reviews, everyone! They mean a lot to me. Please keep them coming!**

* * *

_a)i_)2) Regret__

His tone is happy, lively. It's the happiest Vaughn thinks he's ever heard Weiss sound, as a matter of fact. He begins to grin, wondering what's gotten him so happy, and what it's got to do with Sydney.

"What's up, Eric?"

"Well, I'm just calling to let you know….that um, Sydney and I are getting married. And we'd like for you to be the best man."

**"What?"**

He'd honestly never considered Sydney and Weiss together, not even with the good friendship they'd developed before she'd disappeared.

And now….they were getting married, it seemed.

"You never mentioned anything like this! I didn't even know that you two were going out!"

He's not angry [_not exactly_]…….just surprised.

"We've been spending a lot of time together over the last few years….been working as partners, even, on most of our missions. It just….happened."

He swallows his bile, almost sick to the point of vomiting at the thought of her with another man, and then his heart stops.

[_This is what it was like for her_.]

He hunches over his stomach, holding his middle protectively, trying not to throw up, both from the thought of her with another man, even his best friend, and from the knowledge that he made _her_ feel like this.

He wonders briefly if this is some sort of sick revenge, but he doesn't think that she'd play with Eric's feelings like that. But she's not like that, _not like him._

He had the choice to go with her, after all. And he chose to stay with his wife, someone he loved dearly.

So, in theory, he shouldn't feel like this.

She's not his. Not anymore.

Not since he gave her up.

But then why does it hurt so much to know that she's getting married?

"Vaughn?

Vaughn, are you there?"

He forces himself to swallow, to speak again, to simulate happiness.

Because, after all, he _should be happy. It's his best friend, isn't it? He should be happy that Eric's found someone who will make him happy._

He just wishes it was someone else.

"Yeah, Eric, I'm here. Congratulations! When's the big day?"

His words are empty, hollow even to his own ears, and he thinks Eric can hear the pain in his voice.

"Oh, sometime soon, I think. Summer, maybe. I'm leaving that all up to Sydney though….she'll have the entire thing planned out soon enough. I'll just have to hand over my credit card and pay the bills – oh, and probably show up on the day, but I'm not sure whether or not I actually have to do that…" 

There's humour in his voice, and Vaughn can tell he's teasing someone on the other end of the line.

  
"Ericccccc! Let me talk to Michael."

It's been nearly four years since he heard her voice, and it still sends a lightning bolt straight to his heart like it did the first time he met her, he thinks absently.

"Hi, Sydney."

She calls him Michael, he calls her Sydney. It's impersonal, professional, even, just a fiancée talking to her fiance's best friend.

Their voices are even, controlled, betraying none of the pain [_and still, desire] that lies within their hearts._

"Congratulations, Sydney. I'm sure you two will be very happy together." 

"Thanks, Michael. It means a lot to Eric to have you as his best man."

He swallows the bile down, still, as he hears Eric wrestle the phone off his fiancée, Sydney giggling as she holds the phone out of reach.

Eric sounds a bit out of breath as he comes back to the phone. "Sorry, Mike. You know-"

He cuts off his words, suddenly aware of what he was about to say and exactly how big a mistake it would be to say it.

"_You know what she's like_."

"It's all right, Eric. You don't have to pretend around me. I'm happy for you, really."

It's a lie, every word of it. Because it's not all right, and he really would prefer it if they kept their newly-engaged happiness out of his life. And because he's not happy for them, even though he should be.

Because maybe it shows that she's moving on in a way that he never did, not even when he thought that she was dead.

Because a part of him still loves her, and had always hoped that she'd be his forever [_even when he chose Lauren?_].

It's selfish to want her even after he gave her up, he knows…..but he still wants her. Always has, always will.

But he has two beautiful children, and a wonderful wife, and he thinks that maybe that's enough, that maybe he should finally let go of her [_because he can never have her]._

* * *

  
Six months later, on a beach very like the one on which he married Lauren, he's best man at their wedding.

And as he watches Weiss slide a golden ring onto Sydney's finger, he feels a stab of sharp pain.

And again he realises – _This is what it was like for her._

And he resists the urge to break down and cry for the pain that he caused her.

And he tries to reestablish some sort of control over his emotions, tries to fight back the raging wave of jealousy crashing down within him as the priest pronounces, "You may now kiss the bride," and Eric and Sydney share a passionate kiss.

And the worst thing about it is that he can tell that she meant every single word of her vows, that she does genuinely love Eric.

_She doesn't love you anymore, Mike, his head tells him loudly, almost shouting, at a painful volume into his ear. __And neither do you, it adds on._

_You're both happily married, now – you have children, for crying out loud. You love Lauren, she loves Eric. You're happy, they'll be happy. Everyone's happy. _It's time to let go_._

But his heart whispers to him softly, _You'll__ love her forever…and so will she._

[_he__ will live and die loving her, even while he carries the guilt from the pain caused by the ring that still lies on his finger_]


	6. a ii Broken Promises

_a)__ii) Broken Promises_  
  
They're happy, for a little while.  
  
They both work at the CIA, him as an analyst, her in the field.  
  
He doesn't like her being out in the field, but she tells him it's where she's best placed, and that's the end of that story.  
  
She's away a lot, constantly taking on more and more dangerous missions. She tells him that it's because she needs to make her name known in the agency, to advance up the chain of command.  
  
He doesn't think it's worth her life. [_He never thought she was so ambitious before_]  
  
It's two years after Sydney returned, and three years after they married.   
  
They live in a condo near the Joint Task Force headquarters, where they do most of their work these days.  
  
It's an expensive place to live, but the convenience more than makes up for it.  
  
But still, the money never seems to stretch far enough, not really. They survive, but they don't have a lot of money to spend, not on the salaries of two public servants.  
  
But Vaughn's sick of not having enough money, sick of the constant bills and loans and budgeting, and the driving desire he once felt to serve and protect his country is muted now, driven quieter by the paperwork and the brick walls of bureaucracy and the endless tomes of protocol.  
  
He once told her that what they did was real, was important. He's not sure anymore.  
  
So he tells her that he's leaving the CIA, and that he's finally going to put to good use the law degree he completed over ten years before. His new job pays more, and has better hours.  
  
She's happy, a rising star in the Company. He's happy, his new job having better hours and much better pay than his old.  
  
But there's still something missing, isn't there?  
  
Their condo isn't big, but there's a small room near their bedroom which they've always discussed using as a guest room or study but have never gotten around to redecorating.  
  
It'd be an ideal nursery, they both know.  
  
He stands at the doorway of this room sometimes, and wonders what it would be like with his child in it.  
  
She insists that there's no rush to have children, but he feels the _tick_ of time pressing down, the desire to see his children live, grow, _thrive_ while he is still young enough to appreciate it.  
  
He confronts her about it, one day. In hindsight, it is easy to see that she is stressed, tired, worn out from another day defending their nation……but it is easy to see everything in hindsight, isn't it?  
  
He kisses her as she walks in the door.  
  
"Hey, sweetheart. How was work?"  
  
"Not good," she sighs wearily.  
  
"Look, Laur, I know you don't want to talk about this, but really, we have to discuss the issue one day."  
  
"What're you talking about, Mike?" Her tone is almost defensive, he thinks.  
  
"You know what I'm talking about." [_Two can play at this game_]  
  
"Well, maybe I need you to spell it out for me!" She's angry now, pacing around the room.  
  
"You. Me. Children. Or lack of." He bites out each word, her anger only feeding his.  
  
"Mike, we've discussed this before! It's not the right time in our lives for children!"  
  
"You mean it's not the right time in your life. Not the right time in your career."  
  
"No, it's not," she snaps back at him.  
  
"Well, then, Lauren, tell me this. Is your job more important than your life? Than your marriage? More important than _me_?"  
  
"My job _is_ important! What would you know about it? You're the one who sold out, aren't you? You gave into the private sector, after all. What would you know about serving your country?"  
  
The minute the words are out of her mouth, she knows she has committed a terrible sin, said the worst words she could possibly have said to this man.  
  
"I _wouldn't_ understand, Lauren? I _wouldn't_ **understand**? Did you forget how my father _died_, Lauren?" His words are icy, cold, precise, full of anger.  
  
He grabs a jacket and begins to walk out the door.   
  
"Mike, where are you going?"  
  
"To Eric's. Don't wait up for me." And with a slam of the door, he is gone.  
  
She's in tears even before she hears the sound of his car pull out, realizing exactly what her words might cost her.  
  
It's not the end of their marriage, but it's close enough.  
  
They file for divorce six months later, after thousands of tears, ten major arguments and countless minor ones.  
  
Hers is the first number he rings, and the first words he says to her in nearly four years are the same words he always greeted her with.  
  
"Joey's Pizza?"  
  
* * *  
_In one universe, she will have waited for him, knowing that her guardian angel would never leave her.  
  
In another she's happily married, a child on the way. _  
  
* * *


	7. a ii 1 Mistake

* * *  
_In one universe, she will have waited for him, knowing that her guardian angel would never leave her.  
  
In another she's happily married, a child on the way. _  
  
* * *

_a)__ii)1) Mistakes_

"Vaughn? Is that you?"

Her voice is shocked – understandably so, he thinks, torn between bitterness and amusement.

It is, after all, the first time he's spoken to her in almost four years.

"Yeah." He clears his voice, only now realizing how nervous he had been about making this phone call.

"Syd….I know I screwed up. I know that you'd be perfectly right to say that you never wanted to see me again. All I want is to go to dinner with you."

There's a kind of stunned silence on the other end of the line as she considers his words.

"Vaughn? What about your wife?"

"We're…….we're not together anymore."

"Oh." 

She's never been that great at lying to him, he knows, and that one small syllable that would mean so little to anyone else betrays so much to him. 

Only Sydney, he reflects nervously, had ever been able to pack so many conflicting emotions into such a small word. There is hope in her voice, but anxiety as well, and the knowledge that all this man left her with the last time around was pain, but above all there is the need for completeness that he feels as well.

"I just want to know if you'd like to have dinner with me sometime. Just to catch up or something."

He knows he doesn't want to rush her.

He knows that if she had done to him what he had done to her, she would probably never want to _see _him again, let alone have dinner with him [_and more, maybe?_]

He knows that he's given her a thousand reasons to hang up the phone right now, but he clings only to the hope that what they had together meant more than the anguish that he's caused her in the last four years.

And it does.

"Sure. When, and where, Vaughn?" [_because__ she needs to be completed just as much as he does, after all]_

And if a heart could break from happiness, then Michael Vaughn's would have been in a million shards on the floor at that moment. __

* * *

So they have dinner. It's not Italian [_because the idea of Trattoria di Nardi still lingers too-fresh in both their minds], not French [_because the last time they ate French food together they had to fight their way out of the restaurant_] and it's not Mexican [_because the idea of Santa Barbara still makes both their hearts hurt_]. _

It's only a small restaurant, one that Vaughn thinks looks a little bit like Francie's, but he doesn't say so, because some wounds are still too close to the surface.__

It's awkward, right at the start, just like their first meal together.

They share a bottle of wine just like they did then, and begin to talk about all the things that they never got the chance to learn about one another. By silent agreement, they don't talk about Lauren, or Vaughn's marriage, or the absence of a ring on his finger.

They enjoy themselves, and at the end of the night they find themselves outside Sydney's house, a small place near Vaughn's old apartment, the one he had before he got married.

"Do you- do you want to come in?" He can tell that she knows where they'll probably end up if he comes in, but the need he feels for her is echoed in her words. [_It's been nearly four years since she's seen him, nearly six years since she's kissed him, woken up in his arms._]

"Sure," he replies, trying to keep the raw desire for her out of his voice. [_If possible, he thinks, she's even more beautiful than the last time he saw her._]

And so they go inside.

_Come to me now_

_And lay your hands over me_

* * *

It's not a perfect start, but it's a start, and nothing in their lives has ever been perfect, anyway.

He wakes up the next morning with the most beautiful thing he's ever seen in his arms, and he knows that he was an idiot to ever let her go, an idiot to ever think that he could ever find this feeling of _completeness with anyone else._

[_No one heals me like you_]

He's wasted a lot of time, he knows, with false starts and foolish words, but he knows that really, it doesn't matter. Not that much, anyway. Because he knows that he will never, ever, let her go again. 

[_Never again_

_Would I turn away from you]_

He watches her for a little while longer, until she opens her eyes sleepily and looks up at him. 

"What _are_ you thinking about, Mr. Vaughn?" she asks him coquettishly, and his only reply is, "The biggest mistake of my life."

She tenses up in his arms, and in a tiny voice asks him, "Which would be?"

"Letting you ever get up out of this bed without telling you this."

He drops his head to her ear, and whispers three words to her.

He watches a smile spread across her face, the one that he knows is only for him, and twists herself around in his arms so that she can say the same to him.

[_I love you_.]

* * *

_And I shall believe_

_I shall believe_

_And I shall believe_

**All lyrics from "I Shall Believe" by Sheryl Crow. **

_Reviews much appreciated!_

_Thanks,_

_Em_


	8. a ii 2 Too Long

**Thanks for all the reviews so far! Lyrics from "My Immortal" by Evanescence, and "Lover, You Should Have Come Over" by Jeff Buckley.**

_a)ii)2 – Too Long  
  
These wounds won't seem to heal  
This pain is just too real  
There's just too much that time cannot erase_  
  
* * *  
  
"Vaughn? Is that you?" Her words are broken up a little by static on the line, her voice dropping out every few syllables.  
  
He can hear another voice in the background, male, unfamiliar to him. "Syd, who's that?"  
  
"Oh, just an old friend. Don't worry about it. Keep your eyes on the wheel, Andy!"   
  
_Just an old friend_, he thinks bemusedly to himself. Since when did he become just an old friend to her?   
  
_Probably about the same time I chose my wife, no, **ex**-wife_ over her, he thinks bitterly.   
  
He has a sinking feeling in his stomach, one that he attributes the same gut instinct that told him that she was a genuine walk-in. This isn't going to end well, he knows already.  
  
"Yeah, Syd, it's me." The reception on his cell has improved, he notes a sense of dubious relief; he takes pleasure in hearing her voice for the first time in too long, but dreads hearing what she is about to say.  
  
"Oh. I- I didn't think that you ever wanted to see me again, to be perfectly honest."   
  
"I-I didn't, for a long while."  
  
"So, what changed?"  
  
"Lauren and I- we're not together anymore."  
  
"I'm sorry it didn't work out, Vaughn. She seemed very nice." Her words sound surprisingly sincere to his ears, and he begins to realise that she's taking no more pleasure in the breakdown of his marriage than she would if Will went through the same experience.  
  
"Yeah, well, sometimes people just have different priorities, I guess."  
  
"Yeah."  
  
There's a short pause on both ends of the lines, as they both pause to see who will speak again. She speaks first, quickly, almost a little hastily.   
  
"So what made you look my number up after so many years, Vaughn?" There's more than a little bitterness in her voice, he observes with more than a little sadness. She was often angry with him during their arguments, sometimes sarcastic – but never bitter. Not really.   
  
"I was just wondering if you'd like to have dinner with me. Just to catch up," he adds hastily.  
  
"No, Vaughn, I don't think I'd like to have dinner with you."   
  
It's not a surprise to him, somehow, to hear these words. And why should it be, after everything that he's put her through, he thinks, the regret he feels pressing down on him, making it hard for him to breathe.  
  
He can hear her speak quickly to the man that must be with her, "Andy, you go on ahead. I won't be very long, I promise."  
  
When she comes back onto the line, her voice is strong, clear, almost angry. "Do you know how long I spent getting over you, Vaughn? Accepting the fact that you were married, that you could never be mine? Do you know what a living nightmare it was to come back from the _dead_, more or less, and find you _married_?"  
  
"I'm sorry, Syd. Really. I'm so sorry. For everything."  
  
"I spent two years trying to get over you, Vaughn. I'm not about to let you ruin my life again. Now, if there's nothing else?"   
  
He can tell that she's about to lose it, to either start screaming or start crying, because he feels like that as well. The emotion running throughout him is raw, bitter, overwhelming. It is regret, and grief, and anger and sadness and a sense of coming loneliness all moulded into one little neat package of pain that is spreading throughout his body.   
  
Before it overcomes him, though, he manages to ask one more question.   
  
"Did you ever love me?"  
  
He hears a choked sob on the other end of the line, and can picture the tears running down her cheeks.   
  
"I will _always_ love you. I always _have_ loved you, Vaughn. I just…I can't do this again, Vaughn. You've hurt me too much. I have a- I have a new life now, Vaughn. It's not much, but it's normal and it's _mine_."  
  
He's trying to hold back tears now, biting down on his lip to try to hold back the flood of salty water that he feels lurking behind his eyes.  
  
"I'm sorry, Syd. I'm sorry for everything that I've done to you. I-I understand, okay, sweetheart. I love you too- and-and I hope, I hope that you're happy. I hope he makes you happy."  
  
He disconnects quickly, before she has time to respond, and sits in his car, tears rolling down his face.  
  
It's almost worse than knowing that she's dead, he thinks, because then he knew that she was at peace, hopefully, no longer tormented by all the things that made her life more complicated than it should be.  
  
Now he knows is that she's alive – and with someone else, just as he was.   
  
Now he knows that she loved him – that she had always loved him.  
  
Now he knows that four years ago he made the biggest mistake of his life – but only now is he paying for it.  
  
Now he knows what he was too blind to see before, sees what his eyes were closed to before.  
  
Now he knows that what he's done to her is too much for even her to forgive.  
  
Now he knows he will live the rest of his life alone, because he knows now that no one _fits_ him as well as she does, that no one will ever mean as much to him as he does. He's already tried to replace her once, after all, and look at how that turned out, he thinks, tasting bitter regret on his tongue.  
  
She was always stronger than he was, he muses with some sort of twisted pride burning in his heart, but he can't imagine the strength of will it would have taken her to say the things she said, to push him away, still loving him. He's never been able to deny her anything - except the one thing she wanted, he thinks to himself, the hate he feels for himself for making that decision making him sick to his stomach.  
  
He thought he had ended what they on his terms by returning to his wife, but in the end it was Sydney who ended it, wasn't it? She ended it on _her_ own terms by refusing him as he once refused her.   
  
But this time it's final.   
  
This time there will be no second chances, no last minute reprieves. With this one phone call, she has forever stepped out his life – but he knows he'll spend the rest of his life wondering _what if_ and regretting the four years he wasted letting her get away.  
  
This time he's alone.  
  
* * *  
_Sometimes a man gets carried away, when he feels like he should be having his fun  
And much too blind to see the damage he's done  
Sometimes a man must awake to find that really, he has no-one_  
  
  



	9. b Making it Work

Okay, everyone, we're going back to the very beginning of this fic with this story – this is the reality where Vaughn chooses Syd. J

* * *  
**_b) _****_Sydney_****_ – Making It Work_**

"Syd? It's-it's Vaughn. I know that I'm probably the last person you ever want to talk to right now, but – we need to talk." His voice is quavery, shaking. This is the hardest thing he's ever done – but perhaps the most important.

"I know." Her voice is stronger than his is, but still weak, uncertain. 

_She doesn't know whether or not he's calling to end it finally, to tell her he's staying with Lauren – or calling to tell her what he really wants, what he really needs – her, he thinks with a kind of shocked detachment. Because for him there was never any real choice to be made, was there? __He loves Lauren – she's his wife. But __Sydney__…is __Sydney__. It was always different with her – less about love, and more about completeness. She made him whole, he thinks, craving her presence, her warmth, her love now even more than he did in the first few months after her death._

His mind is made up, but there was never any real question about which way he would jump, at least not to him.   
  
_There was never any debate. Not really. After all, what can stand in the way of two parts of the same soul? Certainly not words said in the grief, pain – torment he felt after her death._

He knows he should feel bad about what he's doing, what he's done to Lauren – and he does. She's a good person, a genuinely nice, talented, beautiful woman who deserves better than what he's doing to her now. And he should feel worse for degrading the sanctity of marriage, for going against the Catholic upbringing that always taught him that divorce was just _wrong – all of this he knows, but – well, he's never played by the rules where Sydney's concerned, has he?_

He remembers with a start his phone call with Sydney, and guiltily speaks again into the phone. 

"I know this is a lot to ask, especially if you still want to kill me – and I don't blame you for wanting to kill me, by the way – but could we get together sometime and talk? Just to see if- to see if we can make this work?"

  
"What about right now?" She says, and he can hear laughter in her voice next to hope, the same hope he feels, the hope that tells him maybe this can work, that maybe she feels the same way as he does.

"What do you mean?"

"For a spy, you're really not very observant, are you, Mr. Vaughn? Turn around."

And he does as she says, and he sees her standing there, a grin on her face, delighting in surprising him.

"Hi." She speaks first, her amusement evident in her voice.

"How'd you know where I was?"

"I went to the hockey rink, because I remember you love it there. But it was closed, so I went to the park. But you weren't there, so I came here," she replies, her tone softer, gentler now. It's not the voice of a friend anymore, but the voice of a lover.

"How'd you know I'd be here?" he asks her softly. 

"You fell in love with me here. You'll always come here."

He's visibly startled by this comment, not because it was necessarily _wrong_ [quite the opposite, in fact] but because she knew it, knew the significance of this place to him.

"How do you know that, Miss Bristow?" he asks her, a hint of humour creeping into his own voice. _Things are going to be all right, _he thinks now. _Things are going to be just fine._

"Because I fell in love with _you here." Her words are soft, but the emotion behind them is not. She looks around the pier slowly before she continues. "And I could never resist this place, not even when I was angry enough to want you dead."_

She comes and sits down beside him on the pier railing, an old white rickety thing that doesn't look like it would support one person's weight, let alone two.

They sit for a while, enjoying the silence and the pleasure of each other's company but at the same time unable to speak for fear of destroying the fragile balance they have only just established. 

She gathers the courage to speak first, much to his relief.

"You want to make this work?"

"More than anything I've ever wanted in the world."

"What about Lauren?"

He looks at the gold ring still adorning his ring finger, and pulls it off. With a quick flick of the wrist, it's gone, into the Pacific where she threw her beeper nearly four years before. 

_Actions speak louder than words._

He speaks again, this time in a flat voice. "She's gone. Or will be, soon. I don't know if she'll be at home when I get there, to be honest."

He pauses, unsure whether or not to continue, but he errs on the side of caution, which with Sydney always involved telling her the truth – the whole truth.

"She knows I'm still in love with you – that I never stopped loving you. You have to understand, Syd, that when I married Lauren – I honestly thought you were dead. She was a nice woman. I knew that I could never be as happy with her as I could have been with you – but you were gone, and she – well, she said she loved me. And I said I did as well. I always knew I was settling for second best….but she was good to me. Heavens knows it was better than I deserve, for what I've done to the two of you."

He sighs. 

"She's a good woman. You'd like her, I think. So much like you in many ways – smart, beautiful, could kick my ass forty-seven ways into Saturday….but she's not you. And she doesn't deserve to be with someone who doesn't love her like I love you."

"I love her – I can't deny that." He hears her draw breath quickly, uncertain of what was to come.

"But marrying her was a mistake. Because she's not you, not a part of me like you are."

He pauses slightly, allowing her to digest what he's just said.

"Have you ever felt like someone made you whole? Or like everything in your life up to a certain point was only there to prepare you for their entrance into your life? Like you were fated to be together, _meant to be together because nothing could ever possibly separate you?"_

"Yes," he hears her say quietly.

They fall silent again, because words are no longer necessary. They both understand, better than words could ever express. 

It's only when he sees her rubbing her arms from the cold breezes coming off the ocean that he stands to leave, hauling her to her feet and giving her his jacket in the process.

"I'm sorry – for everything." 

"I know," she replies, pausing slightly. "So you want it to work?"

"Yes." 

She takes his hand, and they walk off. She leans into his shoulder and rests his head on her shoulder, and somehow, he knows that everything's going to be right. Nothing's going to part them again.

_He chooses the other part of his soul, in this reality._

* * *

Reviews are, you know, very nice…J


	10. b i Reality Bites

**_Lyrics from "Amsterdam" by Coldplay._**

_b)_i__) Reality Bites__

They're happy for a while, that's for sure.

Things are great. They get along even better than they did before. She's a teacher now, just like she always wanted to be. He thinks she was happy, really, when they told her she was too much of a security risk to work as a spy again. 

But he's still in the CIA, still intimately involved the hunt for her parents, believed on the run somewhere in the world, neither cooperating with nor visibly resisting Sloane's attempts to gain control of Rambaldi artefacts. 

She hasn't seen either of her parents since her return, and she still doesn't know what happened to her – or so the CIA psychoanalysts have told him.

She claims not to remember anything more than fighting Francie – _no_, he catches himself mentally. _Allison_. Even two years after her discovery, it's hard for him to reconcile the cold blooded assassin he knows her now to have been with the bubbly best friend she described to him for so long.

He believes her when she says she doesn't remember anything – because, after all, why would she lie to him, anyway?

But she hasn't seen Jack or Irina since her return, and although she's quiet on the subject, to him at least, he knows it's eating away at her inside.

But the actions of her parents are still too close to the surface for him to talk about, especially to her, he knows.

It's always been hard for him, loving the daughter of his father's killer. He knows it sounds vaguely like a melodramatic storyline from some overlit Hollywood soap opera sometimes, but the sheer ridiculousness of it all doesn't make it any easier to live with, does it?

Because try as he might [try as he does, desperately] to separate the concepts of Irina and Sydney in his head, he cannot, just as he knows it is impossible for her to separate the concept of his father from the concept of him. 

_We are all our fathers' sons, and our mothers' daughters, he reflects bitterly, _try as we might to run away from our past_._

He thought he could live with it. And he could for awhile.

  
But there's still a part of him that can't help but hate Irina Derevko more than anything in the world, and there's a part of him that knows how much Sydney's mother came to mean to her in her nine months of residency inside her little glass cage at the Joint Task Force Headquarters.

And at the same time there's a part of him that doesn't know what to make of Jack Bristow, a man he once respected infinitely, and not just because he was Sydney's father. Jack Bristow was, without a doubt, one of the most respected CIA agents of the last thirty years. Vaughn knew agents more senior to Jack who would have given their left arm to have been even a quarter as successful a career as Jack Bristow had had.

But shortly after Sydney's 'death' Jack had disappeared. Just like that.

Six months later, while on a routine op in Paris, Vaughn had seen him strolling, rather happily along the banks of the Seine, hand in hand with Irina.

Three months later he was reportedly involved in a mission planned by Derevko to steal Rambaldi artefacts from the US government – the very organisation he had once sworn to protect.

The idea that Jack could have thrown away the career he had had, the years of service to his country – he couldn't even begin to understand it, not really.

Although there's a part of him that says, _if Sydney had done the things her mother had done, if she had asked you to come with her, told you that she still loved you – there's a part of him that says, _you would go in an instant, patriotism be damned_._

And there's a part of him that knows that if Jack and Irina share even a fraction of what he and Sydney do…well, there would never really be a debate between serving his country or being with the woman he loves.

But he hasn't seen either of her parents in over two years now, as far as the CIA [as far as _he_] knows.

And he knows she misses them both, longs desperately to see them. Because despite their sins, they're still her parents, after all.

_He understands unconditional love all too well._

He accepts her need for her parents because he loves her more than he worries about her seemingly unstoppable obsession with finding her family.

He asks her about it, one day, nearly six months after her return.

"Why is it so important for you to find them, Syd?"

Her tone is quiet, guarded. She doesn't know where he's going with this, he knows.

"They're my parents, Vaughn. I…_need to see them. Especially my mother."_

He tenses at this, as he always does around mentions of her mother, but listens as she continues.

"Before I disappeared…while we were in Mexico City looking for my father…she said some things to me. Things about Rambaldi."

"What sort of things, Syd?" He asks her urgently, knowing that she didn't tell the CIA about this, didn't tell _him about this before her disappearance._

"Things about me. Vaughn, she said…she said that it was me in the prophecy."

"But that's not possible, is it? What about Mount Sebacio?"

"Well, apparently it is, Vaughn." She sounds angry, and desperate, torn between telling him the truth and protecting herself – even from him, he thinks angrily.

"Syd, why didn't you tell the CIA this?"

"Hell, Vaughn, why wouldn't I tell the government that I'm the embodiment of a 16th century prophecy – and that I'm supposed to freaking well destroy something or someone that may or may not be this country for all I know?" She's definitely angry now, her words cascading one after the other. "They wanted to lock me up the first time around as it was! You think that they'd allow me to walk around free as a bird _now?"_

He can see her point…but still, "Why didn't you tell _me?"_

"Because you swore an oath to this country the same as I did, and you would have been duty-bound to report it, just as I would have been!"

He can't believe he's hearing what he is, can't believe that she would think that he would do that rather than protect her.

"You think I would do that? You think I would choose my country over you? Fuck, Syd, you think I haven't betrayed my country enough protecting you? Do you know me so little –_ trust_ me so little?"

"You got _married_, Vaughn! How was I supposed to really trust you ever again?" she yells back at him, every inch as enraged as he is.

"I told you once that I was your ally. I'd like to believe that I still am." There's pain in his eyes as he speaks quietly now, watching her carefully. As his words hit her, there's a brief flash of _something – shock or pain, he can't tell._

"Well, now I know, don't I?" She stalks off at this, and the topic is never brought up again, although things are frosty between them for the next little while, until they settle back into their normal little domestic routine.

Soon enough, though, things are back to normal, and he forgets the whole, ugly little incident.

But somehow he knows that this is not the woman he fell in love with, that her priorities have changed – or she doesn't know him as well as she once did.

But he's happy, and she seems happy, and for a while that's all that matters.

* 

It's three months later when he discovers her sitting at and operating his CIA laptop while she thinks he's in the shower.

  
There's classified information of that laptop, he knows – and so does she.

It's password protected, of course, but he also knows that she's rated 'expert' in codebreaking.

He leaves her with his laptop, making her think he hasn't seen her with it, and goes to take a shower – just like she thought he was doing all along. 

But when he gets a spare moment the next time he opens up the laptop, he quickly hacks into the access records and starts a search for the programs and files last accessed.

He rests his head on his desk while the computer searches, praying desperately that all he'll find is Solitaire, or Internet Explorer, that all she was doing was playing a quick game of cards, or checking her emails in a quick moment of relaxation – that'd she'd forgotten the rules governing the use of government laptops like his by civilians like her.

He prays, yes, hoping in vain that it's not what it looks like.

But somehow he knows what he'll find when he lifts his head from the desk and looks at the results of the search is exactly what it looks like, and it's nowhere near so benign as a mere game of cards.

Because he's always had good gut instincts, and this one is telling him that there's something not quite right here.

And so he lifts his head and opens his eyes, and he sees the programs she's accessed and his heart sinks. She's looked at countless numbers of Word documents, all of them relating to Rambaldi - and Jack Bristow and Irina Derevko.

The last document accessed, he notes with a chill enveloping him, contained the CIA's latest speculations on Jack and Irina's location.

Before he can properly comprehend what he's just learnt, he hears her coming in.

"Vaughn, are you in here? I just got a call from Eric – he wants you to come in early today…" she calls carelessly around the corner.

As if on autopilot, he draws his gun, remembering what he had thought after their argument a few months ago.

[_But somehow he knows that this is not the woman he fell in love with, that her priorities have changed – or she doesn't know him as well as she once did._]

When she turns the corner, his heart catches in his throat at her beauty, as it always does when she enters a room, but he shoves back everything he feels for her, and pins her up against the fridge, her back to his stomach.

He hears a nervous giggle from her, and she says, "Um, Vaughn? Not that I'm not interested in this, but I really don't think you've got time for this, if you're thinking about what I think you're thinking about…"

He presses his gun to her temple then, and her face takes on a more worried expression.

"Vaughn, what are you doing? This isn't funny anymore." Where her voice was amused, almost sultry at first, it is now set, determined.

"Cut the crap, Sydney. If that is your name, really."

"Vaughn, what are you talking about? You're starting to hurt me." Her voice is starting to take on a desperate edge, he notes coldly, forcing himself to see her as no more than another suspected traitor to his country,.

It's the hardest thing he's ever had to do, standing there still as a statue,  grimly pushing a gun to the head of the woman he loves, all the while pushing back every little bit of love he's ever felt for her – pushing back his heart.

But he does it, because he knows that if he did not, everything that he felt for her, the love, the pain, the grief, the tangled little ball of emotions in his heart labelled 'Sydney'…..if he didn't force it back…then it would overcome him.

It's the hardest thing he's ever done, but he does it.

[_And I know I'm dead on the surface_

_But I'm screaming underneath.]_

* * *

_In one reality, she's not who she says she is._

_In another, he loves her enough to let her go._

* * *


	11. b i 1 Release

* * *

_In one reality, she's not who she says she is._

_In another, he loves her enough to let her go._

* * *

_b)_i__)1) Release__

"You accessed classified material on my laptop. Don't try to deny it."

"I won't." Her voice is harsh, but controlled. There's no surprise in her tone, only a forlorn kind of longing.

She's been waiting for this, he realises with a shock. She's been waiting for him to find her out – _wanting to be found out, almost._

"Why, Syd, why?"

He needs to know why she would take to betraying her country – betraying _him_.

"Because Bristows have always been traitors," she says to him sadly. "Do you think you could put down the gun, Vaughn? Please? You can handcuff me, if you like, but please, just put it down. You have my word. I won't try to escape."

And he believes her, if only for an instant.

"I'm not an idiot, Syd. You don't want to spend the next ten years in a Federal jail cell anymore than I want to put you there. The gun stays."

"I was afraid you might see it like that," she sighs.

Before he knows it, he's flat on his back, and then the world goes black.

The last thing he hears is "Sorry about this, Vaughn."

* 

He blinks, and he's handcuffed to a chair in his kitchen, and she's standing in front of him, his own gun trained on him.

"You knocked me out? _You knocked me out?_ Syd, do you have any idea how much that _hurts?"_

"Have you forgotten who you're talking to, Mr. Vaughn?" She asks, allowing a hint of humour to creep into her voice.

He blinks again. "Uh, good point."

"Why, Syd?" He seems to be saying this a lot, he thinks.

"Well, you left me no choice with the gun to the head…"

"No, not that."

She understands now what he's talking about.

"About eight months ago, nearly a month after my return…I started remembering things. Disturbing things. Vaughn, I was _killing_ people….and I wasn't myself. Someone…someone connected to Rambaldi…they were _controlling me."_

He blinks again, still trying to shake off the wooziness from the concussion he's sure he has.

"Vaughn, I have reason to believe that my parents know what I was doing…and more specifically _why I was doing what I was doing while I was 'away' – and what my role in the Rambaldi prophecy is."_

"Syd, I don't understand what this has to do with you stealing classified information from my computer!"

"Vaughn, I need to find my parents. And I need to find them _now_. I _need to know what I did for two years – and I need to know who controlled me, and why they made me do what I did."_

"But Syd, surely – surely the CIA could help?"

"Vaughn, the only thing the CIA wants to do to my parents is lock them both in a _cell_ for the rest of their lives. I can't trust the CIA on this…I can't even explain this to you very well."

He sits blankly, trying to digest what he's just learnt.

"So you're leaving?"

He had meant to say something profound, meant to plead with her not to go…but they were the only words he could find.

"Yes," she says quietly, and he can see the sadness in her eyes threatening to break into tears at any point. "I hacked your laptop so I could find out where my parents where. I…I have a plane ticket booked to there right now. I'll find them there, somehow. And then maybe they'll tell me who I am again. There's a part of me _missing_, Vaughn, this massive hole in my mind where I should have memories…but instead it's just a blank." The tears are beginning to roll down her cheeks, he sees at this point, and she begins to choke out the words. "I'm sorry Vaughn. So, so, sorry."

"I know," he says sadly, all the longing in the world contained in his voice.

"I'll-I'll understand if you move on – or go back to Lauren. I can't promise you when I'll be back. It could be next year," she swallows, visibly struggling to force out the words, "It could be never."

"You know I'll wait for you forever….like I should have last time," he says, the sadness and pain in her voice reflected in his own.

"You have to believe me when I say that I didn't know any of this would happen when you divorced Lauren. I would never have asked you to leave her – never would have _let_ you leave her if I had known that this would happen. You have to believe me when I say this, Vaughn!"

"I believe you," he whispers quietly.

Because he does.

He would ask her to stay, and he knows she would.

But he can't, and he knows it.

Because he loves her enough to let her go, and he knows to have her stay [_just for him_] would be to kill her, slowly but desperately, craving her identity and memory like a wilting plant craves water.

He loves her enough to let her go.

[_If you truly love something, set it free... if it does not return to you, it was never yours to claim for your own._]

"I know," she says, as she lowers the gun and leans in and kisses him, hungrily, as if she knows it will be the last time.

"Goodbye, Vaughn. I love you…and I'm sorry. So, so sorry." She's crying openly now, not even trying to pretend to hold back her tears. 

"I'd rather have thirty minutes of wonderful with you, than a lifetime of nothing special with anyone else," he says slowly. _Steel Magnolias_ isn't his favourite movie, not by a long shot, but that quote……well, a good quote is a good quote, no matter where it's from.

She recognises the quote, and smiles briefly. "That's a very girly movie for a man to know quotes from, Vaughn," she says, straightening up slowly.

"I'm really not a very average guy, Sydney. I thought you would have realised that by now," he says with a forced grin, trying to lighten the situation with a bad joke like he'd watched Eric do for so many years.

"True," she says ruefully, a faint grin playing across her own lips.

He knows that if they weren't laughing, they'd be crying.

"I can't go with you, can I?" he says desperately, in a last ditch attempt to stop her from walking out of his life again.

"I can't do that to you, Vaughn. I need to find myself……I need to find out who I am again. It may take me years…I may never find out, knowing how much the CIA want to find my parents. I can't let you spend the rest of your life following me on some crazy quest."

He objects to what she says, oh, so much; he wants to shout out that he would follow her to the end of the earth forever, if only she would ask him…but he won't say it and she'll never ask.

And instead he'll love her from afar, until she finds herself, he thinks bitterly…but she'll always be a part of him, whether she's a thousand miles away or in his bed every morning.

"Goodbye, Vaughn."

He knows she'll probably never return. 

He knows that the next phone call he'll have to make will be to the CIA, to tell them she's gone.

But he knows he'll wait a few hours, to give her a headstart.

He knows he'll probably face severe consequences for this. He might even be fired.

He knows all of these things.

But he doesn't regret it. Any of it.

Because what they had, what brief happiness they had…it was enough.

_It has to be enough._


	12. b i 2 Blindness

* * *

_In one reality, she's not who she says she is._

_In another, he loves her enough to let her go._

* * *

_b)_i__)2 Blindness__

"You accessed classified material on my laptop. Don't try to deny it."

"Vaughn, what _are_ you talking about? This is me! Would I do something like that?"

"The Sydney I knew would never do something like that." His tone gets harsher, and he leans against her more, feeling the tense muscles of her back against his chest. "But you're not the Sydney I know, are you?"

There's something very wrong here, he knows, but he can't put a name to it. He just knows that this is wrong – _she_ is wrong.

He feels the muscles of her back suddenly move, but he can't do anything about it before she takes him down.

* 

He blinks. 

Once.

Twice.

Three times, before his head clears enough for him to realise that there's nothing wrong with his vision, that what he sees before him is reality, not the most twisted nightmare he's ever had.

Sydney stands in front of him, a cruel smirk on her face.

He's tied hand and foot to one of their kitchen chairs, rope cutting into his ankles and wrists as he struggles against the bonds.

"Ah, Mr. Vaughn, how nice of you to rejoin the land of the living," she purrs to him, her words as cold as ice, even coming from his lover's lips.

"Who- Who are you?"

"Wow," she coos, "You're smarter than you look. You may call me….Ana."

He flinches at the name, and recoils back from her disdainful glance. Sydney's told him about Ana Espinosa, one of the last Cold War babies taken from Cuban parents and raised as a Russian.

He realises now why she seemed colder, more distant at times, overemotional at overs – the 'perfect' Sydney, but almost too perfect. She was almost a caricature of herself.

And the only thing he can think of as every moment of the last eight months flashes before his eyes, every kiss, every caress, every whispered moment shared is this.

"You're a lot better at this than Allison was."

She chuckles aimlessly at this. "Allison was an amateur compared to me, darling," she says, a hint of a Russian accent in her words.

"But the machine we found could only be used on people of the same gene type," he says, trying to puzzle out the mystery that's presented itself to him.

"You're more innocent than I thought! You really thought that Sloane would be naïve enough to work with someone like Markovic on a project that important without having someone on the inside who would keep him supplied with plans for the machine? Sloane's scientists had over a year to reconstruct the thing – and improve it. It wasn't too hard, sweetheart," she says, drawing out a single cigarette from some hidden place on her body, and lighting it with a small lighter from the same place.

  
She blows a puff of acrid smoke towards him, and begins to laugh quietly, the sound low and harsh and throaty.

"Sloane let me be there when they killed her, you know. She screamed out your name, over and over and over again while they killed her," she laughs, louder now, a cruel grin playing across her features.

  
"It was the first – and last time I'd ever felt _sorry for Sydney Bristow. Although I must say I did feel gratitude for leaving me all these wonderful toys," she sneers, leaning in and chucking the underneath of his chin while he struggles desperately against his bonds._

He'd thought he'd felt anger before, when Sydney had disappeared.

He'd thought he'd felt hate before, when Irina Derevko had reappeared three years before.

But he knows know that they were pale imitations of the emotions he feels now towards the woman standing in front of him, the emotions threatening to overwhelm him at that moment.

He spits at her, enjoying a brief moment of satisfaction as he watches her jump back slightly.

"She's dead, then?" he chokes out, his grief welling up along with his rage and hate.

"Yes, Agent Vaughn, she's dead. Finally, this time, I'm afraid."

"How long?"

"A year after she disappeared. I spent twelve months interrogating her, learning everything I could about her……and then they killed her. And then I spent another year with that bastard Sloane before he finally decided I had learnt enough to fool everyone – including you."

"You were – very good, I'll give you that," he says, grudgingly. 

"Why, thankyou, Mr. Vaughn. I'm afraid I can't say the same for you, though. I mean, a trained CIA agent, and still so foolish? Didn't you ever wonder how I knew where you were that night on the pier? Do you think I'd have been stupid enough to let you go back to that pretty blonde wife of yours and waste my chance to get info off you?" she says, still puffing away on her cigarette, the smell making him leaning back in the chair, away from her.

"You never…you never gave me any reason to not believe you…and you were right about the pier," he says quietly, muting his words in some sort of respect for the dead.

"Yes, well, Sydney always was melodramatic, wasn't she?"

There are tears running down his face now, from the grief and the hate and the rage burning up inside of him.

"I'll kill you. It may be tomorrow. It could be next year. It might be twenty years from now. But I _will_ avenge her."

"Now, isn't that cute," she sneers, pointing a pistol to his forehead as she extinguishes the cigarette.

"You know what, Agent Vaughn? I'm going to be very, very kind to you, and leave you with a little bit of advice that I learnt in spy school. 'Emotions get you killed.' You never learnt that lesson well enough, did you, Agent Vaughn?" Her words are mocking, derisive, every one as painful to hear as a blow to the face would have been to endure. "And I'm afraid I can't exactly leave you here, not after what I've just told you! Especially considering all those nasty little death threats!"

She cocks her gun at him, and he knows that he will die here, at the hands of a woman who wears the face of his lover, a woman who had spent the last nine months weaselling her way into his life, his bed, his heart. And _why, he thinks aimlessly? _Because he had been fooled by her resemblance to the woman he always had, always would love_._

He's been fooled well, he'll admit that much. Sloane and his lackeys had chosen well both their target and their weapon.

Because Sydney has always been his weakness – and his strength.

She cocks the gun in his face, louder this time, and his eyes slowly refocus on the weapon, knowing that there is no way out, no last minute escape this time.

He'll die here, but somehow he doesn't mind that much.

Because he'll die, and then he'll be with her.

He smiles at Ana, grins, almost, daring her to take the shot.

"Goodbye, Agent Vaughn."

And all there is is black….and Sydney.

[_"We are all born for love. It is the principle of existence, and its only end."]__  
  
_

  
  



	13. b ii Happy Ever After

_b) ii) Happy Ever After___

When he was younger, and his mother still read him bedtime stories of gallant, perfect heroes overcoming evil and rescuing beautiful, flawless princesses, he'd often dreamt of himself battling evil overlords or dark wizards in armour with a sword in order to rescue the beautiful damsel in distress, who would miraculously and instantaneously fall in love with him upon the moment of rescue.

They'd get married, of course, and become the King and Queen of whatever good country they were in, and have perfect, talented children.

He's older now, of course, and he outgrew his mother's fairytales many years ago.

And he learnt many years ago that heroes are rarely perfect, and women rarely helpless damsels in distress needing to be saved.

He's not a hero [_he'd like to be one one day though_] but he sees them at work every day. They don't fight with swords or spells, but the demons they battle with technology that no medieval knight ever thought of are far more deadly than an evil knight ever was.

His princess isn't flawless, isn't perfect, not by a long shot, and they're not living a fairytale life.

But they're happy, and somehow he thinks that that's all that matters.

Their relationship isn't perfect...she's impulsive, he's overly cautious, and they're both as stubborn as hell. They argue sometimes, over trivial things, loudly and not caring about the other's feelings...but in the end the kiss and make up, and that's half of the fun, anyway.

They married six years to the day after they met, two years after her return and a year after his divorce became final. He proposed to her on her birthday, at the pier where they fell in love the first time around, and where he returned to her four years later, and they were married nearly eighteen months later.

It was a small ceremony, in a beautiful stone chapel, the same one, in fact, where his parents were married over forty years before.

Weiss was his best man, of course, and Will was her maid - no, he corrects himself with a mental chuckle, _man_ of honour [_she'd always imagined Francie as her maid of honour...but life doesn't work out the way we want it to, does it?_]. He can still remember the look on Will's face when they asked him to be her maid of honor - his expression torn between utter horror, pride...and well, shock. He's pretty sure that Eric still hasn't let Will live it down, not unless he was getting mellow in his old age, because he knows Eric far too well to think that he would so quickly move on given such great material with which to make fun of someone. Plus, it was Will, who had always been way too easy to get a reaction from...

His mother was there, of course, and Sydney's father as well. He thinks somehow that Irina Derevko was there as well, in some way, even with a wedding party involving no less than five CIA agents, plus a few more in the congregation.

But he's made some sort of peace with Irina's actions....he'll never accept her fully, of course, but he knows how much she means to Sydney, and so he's learnt to tolerate her over the years. And Irina's mellowed a little with the years, and her retirement, he reflects with faint amusement, something he attributes squarely to Jack Bristow's influence.

_They say that time heals all wounds. _

He doesn't agree, but he thinks that maybe the pain lessens with years, and so, when he sees Irina Derevko these days, the urge to draw his service pistol and shoot her is a little less insistent, and the gutwrenching anguish he felt all those years ago as a boy doesn't hurt him quite so much.

Time doesn't heal all wounds, no, but it makes it easier to deal with the pain.

They're both still with the CIA, although neither of them are full-time field agents anymore. She works mainly as an analyst now, and they promoted him to the role of deputy director a little while ago, much to his surprise.

She moved out of field missions when she was pregnant, and while she still does the occasional mission - just to 'keep her hand in' as she insists, they're few and far between. He still doesn't sleep when she's in the field, and he doesn't think he ever will.

She gave birth to a beautiful little girl, Catherine, two years after they married. 

They've talked about having more children - certainly, he'd love a son, but he loves his daughter more than he's ever loved anyone except her mother, of course.

She's the most precocious and highly intelligent infant either of them have ever seen - not that they're at all biased, of course. She has her father's green eyes, and her mother's brown hair, and she's the most adorable thing in the world, even when she's throwing a temper tantrum, which, even at such a young age having inherited both her parents' stubbornness combined, she does with an amazing frequency.

It's her third birthday today, and he enjoys the silence of the early morning, knowing that his peace and quiet will be disturbed soon by an overly energetic little girl hunting for birthday presents.

But until that happens, he's more than content to lie in bed bathing in the warmth that the sunlight streaming in through their bedroom windows brings, watching it envelop his still-sleeping wife in a seeming halo of golden light, every inch an angel. He lies with one arm tossed over her back, trying not to wake her at such an early hour. He knows how stressed she's been in the last few days, what with all the fuss over Catherine's birthday party. So he lies in the tangled white sheets of their bed, waiting for his daughter's entrance, and reflecting on how lucky he is.

His life isn't perfect, because there's no such thing as a perfect life, at least not those described in such flowing prose and imagery that decorated the pages of his storybooks as a child.

But he thinks that he wouldn't exchange what he has for all the fairytale lives in the world.

He has a wife who makes him whole, makes him feel complete, a woman who he loves more than anything in the world, except, perhaps, the daughter she gave him. 

They're his angels, his guiding light.

He can't describe in words what they mean to him, really. He just knows that he'd rather die himself than see either of them hurt, would willingly give up anything to protect them - not that his 'I can kill a man with two punches' wife _needs_ protecting, he thinks with a grin.

They're all he wants in this world, all he _needs_ in the world.

They're his everything.

He's normally not a religious man, but it's moments like these, when he remembers how lucky he is that he found her once, thought he'd lost her but got her back again in the end....it's moments like these ones that he feels like praying. Because he doesn't think he can chalk it all up to luck, or making good decisions, because luck's really not that powerful, and he'd made some pretty appalling decisions along the way.

His mother, a devout Catholic, had always brought him to church on Sundays as a child. But as he grew older, he began to find more and more excuses to avoid church - because it was hardly the coolest thing for a teenage guy to be seen doing, was it, or so he thought at the time.

But he can remember liking church, remember enjoying the feelings of tranquility and peace that had washed over him as he had listened to the sermons and the hymns sung.

And so he thinks that maybe church - and religion, weren't really all that bad, and that maybe it's time he started seeing if sermons and hymns could still evoke the same feelings that they once did.

After all, God does deserve some thanks for bringing them both into his life, doesn't he?

"Mommy! Daddy! It's my bwirthday!" At that moment, a ball of hyperactive toddler lands squarely on his stomach, and all thoughts of religion promptly fly squarely out of his head.

"Good morning, angel," he says with a slight grimace as he rubs the area of his stomach which had, moments before, served as a landing pad for said angel.

"Daddy, it's my bwirthday!"

"Birthday, sweetheart, _birthday_," says his wife, rubbing sleep from her eyes and sitting up in bed. "What _time_ is it?"

"Just a bit before seven, dear," he says, kissing her on the cheek as he rolls out of bed and grabs an old Kings jersey from the chair near their bed. "Now, angel, what was it you were trying to say?"

"Daddy, it's my bwirthday!"

"Yes, Katie, I think we had realised that," Sydney replies with a laugh from the bed, their daughter in her arms.

"I'm three! I'm three!"

"Yes you are, princess."

She screws her face up in sudden seriousness before speaking again. "Mommy, Daddy...can I have my presents now?"

He opens his arms wide, and she flings herself into them, arms wrapping around his neck as her legs wrap around her waist. "Do you want to go and hunt them down with me?"

"Yes pwease, Daddy." She twists herself around so she's on his back, and shouts, "Giddup, Daddy! Giddup!"

He sighs. She's still obsessed with horses, apparently. He'd hoped that maybe she'd have grown out of it overnight - his back really is getting sore from being a pony.

When he returns, Katie at his side and his arms full of presents, she squeals, "Mommy! Look what we found!" 

"Wow! What a large stack of presents! Are they all for you?"

"Mommy, it's my birthday. I think that they're for me. And guess what?"

"What, sweetheart?"

"Daddy was a horsie for me! All the way downstairs, too!"

She looks away as she nearly starts shaking in her efforts to restrain her laughter, before looking at him with a perfect poker face and saying, "I'm sure Daddy makes a very good horse."

As he gets back into bed with her, their daughter at the end of the bed with all the presents, she kisses him on the cheek and whispers, "You're a good father."

"Yeah, well, I'd better be. My back is killing me now." He's complaining, but it's all in good fun, despite the exaggerated way in which he's rubbing his back.

"Can I open my presents yet?"

It's this question from their offspring which snaps them back into the present.

"Yes, sweetheart, go ahead," she says, leaning down to help her unwrap her gifts.

No, his life's not perfect, and neither is he. 

But somehow he thinks he's living happily ever after. 


	14. b ii 1 Sacrifices

_b)ii)1 Sacrifices_

Catherine is four by the time they're called into Kendall's office one morning after dropping her off at preschool near the JTTF headquarters, and every bit as bouncy and overly energetic as ever. She's recently starting reading, even without any formal instruction, much to their surprise and pride. Sydney's convinced that she's going to be an English major just like she was, but he knows that they'll both be proud of her for the rest of her life, no matter what career path she chooses. 

"Good morning, Bristow, Vaughn," says Kendall, nodding to them both in turn with a slight smile. 

He knows from the smile on his face that whatever they've been called in here for must be good, or at very least big, if even Kendall's smiling. For this reason, he's really not all that surprised that the next person through the door is his father-in-law, even given Jack Bristow's semi-retirement, which Vaughn's still finding hard to come to terms with, because an idle Jack Bristow is really quite a daunting prospect. But 'semi-retirement' for Jack Bristow means, oh, only about as much work as Vaughn's typical workload, so it's not quite so daunting a concept as it would be if Jack had opted out of the Company altogether, and taken up some sort of harmless hobby like, oh, golf. The mental image of Jack Bristow in par fours is quite an amusing one, really, and he struggles to stifle a grin at the thought as Jack kisses Sydney on the cheek and sits down in a chair next to the couch where the Vaughns have seated themselves. 

"Well, you're probably wondering what we've called you in for today, so I'd best get straight to the point," starts Kendall. "As you very well know, Arvin Sloane is currently #1 on both ours and Interpol's most wanted list - and has been for nearly five years now. Despite this and other measures taken to locate and detain him, we have, up until this point, been unsuccessful in our efforts to obtain any information relating to his location." 

He senses his wife's body tense up next to his at the mere mention of Arvin Sloane, the man who has cost her so much, taken from her so much that she deserved to have. 

"Until this point, sir?" he asks cautiously. 

"The highest level - and _only_ the highest levels, of US intelligence, which is why I've had to keep you, Agent Vaughn, out of the loop on this one," he says, nodding in Vaughn's direction, "have recently received information regarding Sloane's information from a source high up within his organization." 

"A double?" asks Sydney, sitting up even more ramrod straight than usual in his chair. 

"We believe so. Jack," Kendall says, inclining his head towards Vaughn's father in law, "has been working as the handler for this agent, due to the sensitivity of the case. He's the only other agent in the LA branch with a high enough security clearance." 

"Are you sure it's not a triple, someone planted by Sloane to give us false information that might lead us into a trap?" That was Sydney again, and Vaughn could almost see the wheels working even faster than usual in her head. 

"All the information we have indicates otherwise." 

There's a creeping suspicion niggling in the back of his head, and he voices it so he can get rid of it, because it really is a ridiculous idea anyway. "You- you haven't turned _Sark_, have you?" 

The quick look that Kendall exchanges with Jack is enough to confirm his worst fears. 

"No! I refuse to believe that that lapdog Sark would ever turn on his master." That was his wife again, nearly about to burst out of her seat next to him. Age certainly hadn't mellowed her much, and at the age of forty she was still every bit as passionate as she was at twenty-eight, and in as physically fit as she ever had been, or so he thinks. 

"Agent Bristow, I'd appreciate it if for once you could restrain your personal bias on this issue!" shoots back Kendall rapidly, as he feels his heckles rise at the sight of a bureaucratic jackass like Kendall taking potshots at _his_ wife. 

"If you wanted objectiveness, you wouldn't have brought us in!" he replies for his wife. "You know what Arvin Sloane cost us." 

Yes, he thinks to himself, he knows what Arvin Sloane cost him - two years with Sydney, two years wasted trying to forget her, two years spent thinking that he could ever truly be happy without her...... Arvin Sloane cost him the most precious yet intangible thing in the world, he thinks; Arvin Sloane cost him _time_. 

And as he looks at his wife's face, he knows that she's thinking the same thing, although there's still pain in her eyes, the guilt and pain and anger she felt twelve years ago with Danny Hecht's death, and again two years later with Francie's death. 

Kendall has to, however grudgingly, acknowledge his point. "While you both may be highly biased in this matter, you're still the best we've got," he admits. 

"So where does Sark say Sloane is?" he asks cautiously, knowing how much it would mean to Sydney and Jack...and himself, he admits, to see Sloane behind bars. 

"Now here's the interesting thing. Apparently he's gone and based himself here in LA again, in a downtown building not far from where Credit Dauphine was based." 

"It actually makes a surprising amount of sense when you think about it, especially given Sloane's rather sizeable ego," adds Jack. "He believes that he's unbeatable - and after all, where better to hide than in clear sight?" 

"You still haven't given me an answer to my question, Kendall," says his wife, a dangerous tone creeping into her voice. "How do we know Sark's legit?" 

"To be perfectly honest, Agent Bristow, we don't. But all the other info he's given to us _has_ been verified and established as legit. We suspect that he's motivated primarily by ego, as well as money, and is therefore unlikely to be swayed. He appears to have tired of working Sloane's lackey," Kendall answers. 

"Took him long enough," mutters Sydney, nearly but not quite under her breath. 

"He's apparently looking to either retire from the business comfortably or branch into more legit business," continues Jack, choosing to ignore Sydney's interruption. 

"I'll believe that when I see it," snarks Sydney again, and this time he really has to struggle to keep a straight face. Time certainly hasn't diminished her contempt for the cocky British assassin, he reflects with a small snort of laughter that is quickly stifled into a cough at the sight of his wife's patented 'You think this is _funny_?' glare.

"To be perfectly honest, Agent Bristow, it doesn't matter if you - _either_ of you," Kendall adds, indicating Vaughn and Sydney, "believe any of this. The go-order on this mission came from the highest levels of this agency. We're going to take down Sloane whether you're a part of this mission or not. Professional and personal courtesy, however, insists that I extend an offer of involvement to both of you."

She tenses again sitting next to him, and he squeezes her hand. It's up to her, he knows, to decide whether or not they'll be involved and in what way, although he has a suspicion that she'll want to be in the field for this mission, however much he hates the idea. He'd given up trying to prevent her from going into the field long ago, and knows that trying to keep her out of the field for this particular mission would be especially futile.

"Yes," she breathes quietly. "Yes, we'll help you bring him down."

And he knows what it will mean to her, to have finally achieved some sort of final closure on such a horrific part of her life, to finally avenge her all dead - and so he doesn't try to stop her.

"Thank you, Agent Bristow." Kendall says, and for a moment Vaughn thinks he might even look sincere.

* 

It's a week later when the operation finally goes ahead, and almost everybody they know from the agency is involved - Eric, Marshall, Carrie, Dixon and Will, with Jack as the agent in overall control of the operation given his close involvement with the case. It's just like old times, really, he thinks with an almost nostalgic smile. 

He's decided he'll work in the field, next to his wife, as he did the day they brought down SD-6 nearly ten years before.

But he thinks that this might just be his last field-op, because he really is getting too old for this kind of thing, and there's really no need for him to work in the field anymore, given his seniority.

They embrace quickly before they go into the building, an outwardly ramshackle old warehouse similar to the one in which they met for so long.

He whispers "I love you," into her ear, and she just nods, her face taut with emotion. She's been waiting for this day for far too long, he knows.

He traces gently the shape of the gold crucifix that hangs at her neck with one finger and then quickly slips it underneath her black Kevlar vest, and they pray quietly together, her head resting on his shoulder.

He had gone to church that Sunday, just over a year ago, and so had she, and nearly every Sunday after that.

It had taken him a little while to remember what he had been taught as a child, but the other members of the church had welcomed them both with open arms, and hadn't been long before they'd both come to understand the message of Christ. It had taken them a little longer to fully welcome God into their lives, but they had...and they've both been happier, more complete than ever been before since then.

"It's time to go," announces Eric from the front of the van their team had traveled in, and he's both happy but surprised to see that there's not a hint of a smirk on his face after watching their embrace.

*

The mission goes perfectly, almost too perfectly.

They encounter only piecemeal resistance as they enter the building, working through the side corridors into the central atrium, where Sark had told them they would find Sloane and his vault of Rambaldi artefacts.

But as they enter the large, airy room, they see....._nothing_.

He's on his comm immediately, radioing back to base what they've found. "Base Camp, this is Boyscout. Target is _empty_, I repeat, _empty_."

He hears Jack Bristow reply almost immediately, his normally calm tones frantic and hurried, "Boyscout, get out! Mission is a trap, I repeat, a trap. Evacuate _now_."

But it's too late.

Arvin Sloane steps out from behind a door, Sark following him. Instantly, the weapons of nearly eighty CIA, FBI and ATF agents shoot up, Vaughn's included, but Sloane merely chuckles. 

"Please do put down your weapons." Sloane's voice is calm, controlled, and he sounds every inch in control of his environment.

And he is, he realises with a shock, seeing numerous 'ports' for weapons open in the walls of the room, transforming it into a makeshift shooting gallery. Not even the bulletproof vests they're all wearing can possibly protect them from the kind of firepower Sloane has ready to use on them.

"I don't want to kill you all, so please, do put down your weapons," Sloane repeats.

"Drop them!" he orders, from the front of the pack of agents, seeing no other way out of the ambush they've walked into, and knowing that every moment spent negotiating with Sloane is another moment he'll think that he's in control of the situation – meaning another moment that he'll be off his guard. "Drop them, everyone."

The agents follow his orders warily, but they do follow them, and that's the only thing that really matters.

He steps out in front of Sloane, pushing Sydney behind him as he goes.

"How?"

Sark steps forward from Sloane's side, and answers. "Ah, Mr. Vaughn. So nice to see you again!"

"Go to hell, you son of a bitch," he replies, not really caring very much for manners right now.

"I have no doubt that that is where I'm headed, actually," Sark replies, smirking.

"Answer the question, Sark," snarls Sydney from behind him.

"Once a traitor, always a traitor," Sark says calmly, Sloane standing motionless behind him.

"I should have known," she mutters calmly, all trace of humour gone from her voice.

Sloane steps forward then, a small smile appearing on his face. "Mr. Vaughn, it's a pleasure to meet you at last."

"It's a pleasure I could have lived without," he replies coldly.

"I presume that you're the agent in charge of this little operation?"

He nods, wondering exactly what Sloane's up to. But whatever it is, he's pretty sure that it's not something he particularly wants to see.

"Then I have a deal for you."

"I don't do deals with traitors," he replies grimly.

"Oh, I think you do. Or don't you remember Irina Derevko?"

He flinches at the mention of his mother-in-law's name as he remembers the deal he did with her all those years ago for the cure to the virus that nearly killed him.

"Quite the mother-in-law from hell, isn't she?" asks Sloane, a broad smirk on his face.

"What do you want, Sloane?" he growls.

"I'm prepared to let you all go - in exchange for one trivial little thing."

"What?" he asks warily.

"Your wife," Sloane replies quite calmly. "You give me Sydney, and I'll let you all go."

"No way in hell am I letting-" he starts to say, before he's interrupted by another voice from behind him.

"Done," he hears his wife say distantly.

He spins around rapidly, unable to understand what he's hearing her say. "Sydney, no!"

"Vaughn, it makes _sense_. Think about it! One life for eighty. It's worth it."

"Not your life, it's not!" 

Her voice is quieter, calmer now, as if she is resigned to her fate. "Vaughn, I'm not afraid." She reaches up to her neck, and pulls out the small gold cross hanging around her neck. 

She moves to hug him, and he never wants to let her go, but he knows he can't stop her. There's a part inside of him, the CIA officer in him, that tells him that it's the best way to get his agents out of this killing chamber, but he can't bring himself to consciously think of sacrificing his wife.

"Syd-" She puts a finger to his lips, before removing it to kiss him quickly.

"I love you. And I'm not afraid. Just- just look after Kate, won't you?" The tremor in her voice is the only outward sign of her pain, but he can only imagine the emotions rushing through her at that moment.

He's still too numb to understand it fully, but he knows he can't let her go. An idea comes to his mind, and he knows it's the best way, the only way, because he swore an oath to protect her, and he's not about to let her go with that sick son-of-a-bitch. "No," he says faintly.

"I'm sorry, Mr. Vaughn?"

"No. No deal. You're not taking her. Take me instead," he replies, his voice strengthening as he becomes even surer of what he will do.

"I'm sorry, Mr. Vaughn, but I want your wife, not you."

He hadn't been prepared for this. Nothing in the CIA Handbook had ever told him that someday he'd have to give his wife to some sick bastard just to save the lives of his agents.

Sydney turns back to him, and there's a look on her face that he'll see every day for the rest of his life. On her face there's the most incredible mix of love and longing and pain - but there's strength there, and courage, and he knows that she's telling the truth when she says that she's not afraid of death.

This moment will haunt him for the rest of his life, the moment when his heart, his everything tells him that she's not afraid, that she'll see him soon enough, that it's what she was meant to do.

"I'm not afraid, Vaughn," she repeats, her voice still strong, "This is what I was meant to do. Besides," she whispers, now, "I've always wanted to be a hero." She even grins slightly, at this last comment, and he can't believe she's this strong, strong enough to make a joke when inside he is breaking and in so much pain he can barely breathe.

He would have willingly died for her, but it's not enough to save her and the eighty-odd agents under his command.

He holds her tightly, never wanting to let her go, wanting to go in her place - but he can't.

"Look after Kate. Do you hear me?" she says, "You are not allowed to fall apart! You are not allowed to feel guilty about this, Vaughn! Live for me, live for Kate. Be strong. And never forget that I love you."

"Never," he breathes, tears running down his face.

"I'll see you again, one way or another, okay?" she says softly.

He just nods mutely, unable to speak for all the overwhelming emotions wracking his body.

She breaks out of his embrace then, and he can see tears welling in her eyes as she tries to blink them back before she walks over to Sloane. "You tell your men to stand down," she orders, "And you let them leave. I don't hand over my weapons until then. And before you get any ideas - if they're harmed in _any_ way whatsoever, then I will blow your head off." Her voice is icy cold, but he can tell that she's hurting inside same as he is. 

Sloane presses a combination of buttons on a small keypad on the door he had originally entered the room in, and the weapons 'ports' disappear, sliding back behind the walls once again.

"You and your men are free to go, Mr. Vaughn," he says coolly. "Oh, and I must ask you to not interfere with anything that might happen in this building in the next few minutes? Otherwise - well," he says, chuckling slightly, "I think you know what the consequences might be."

He nods mutely, turning to leave as if in a dream, unable to fully understand what he's about to do.

His brain's frantically trying to find some way to save the day, but it can't think of anything, it's so clouded with the mass of emotions are racing through his head.

But as it turns out, he's not the one who comes up with the way to save her, not this time around.

It's Dixon.

The man who had partnered her for two years not knowing her true allegiance, the man who had worked for Sloane for over ten years without ever suspecting who he was really working for, the man who had lost his wife at the hands of Sloane and Allison Doren.

He watches, stunned, as Dixon draws his weapon and shoots Sloane quickly in the head, and turns his gun to Sark.

Dixon's shot hits Sark – but it's not good enough to kill him, only wound him enough.

He'll probably die of his wounds, Vaughn assesses remotely, as detached from the events happening in front of his eyes as if they had been appearing on a television screen in front of him.

Sark has enough time to get off two shots before collapsing.

One hits Dixon in the throat, and he crumples instantly.

The other hits his wife, the woman who had been prepared to sacrifice herself for her friends and colleagues not so long before.

It hits her in the shoulder, and she falls back.

As he watches her fall, it is as if a video stopped mid-frame has suddenly been fast forwarded.

He rushes forward, and where he couldn't feel anything a few moments before, he's suddenly almost bent over double at her side, shaking with all the emotions he's feeling.

"Syd," he manages to choke out, fearing the worst as he sees the dark blossom of blood across her shoulder – no, he realises, as a stab of fear hits him and turns his stomach to ice, the shot didn't hit her in the shoulder. It's hit at the base of her neck, just off to the left hand side towards her shoulder.

"Vaughn…don't worry. Not afraid," he hears her choke out, still sticking to that one line, without a doubt the bravest person he's ever met.

He thinks to himself almost blankly…_she's dying._

She can't move anymore, and her face is going as white as a sheet, and his stomach is like ice and he can't move either and, _ohgodohgodohgodshe'sdead._

*

_She's dead_.

It's three weeks later, _twentyonedays since she died, and he's still numb._

He keeps it together during the day, not letting himself go back to the bottles which he relied upon so much the first time around – he catches himself and nearly laughs. How many men can say that their wives died twice?

He keeps it together during the day for his daughter, the only part of his wife he has left, apart from a closet full of her clothes, a closet he can barely bear to open for fear of crying again, apart from the house full of _her_ that he has, the house which is just bursting to the seams full of her and her life with him…

He keeps it together during the day for the brown haired little girl who looks so much like her mother it makes him want to break down in tears again.

Weiss hadn't let him drive himself home that day, for fear of him driving the car off a bridge, by accident or intent, he doesn't know.

He had driven him to Katie's preschool, where the owner, a young woman with innocent looking eyes and a friendly smile, had waited with her until her father had arrived to pick her up.

Weiss had spoken to her quietly, taken her aside, and they had spoken words he hadn't been able to hear. But he could hear her loud gasps, and seen how her eyes had instantly flashed to him, wondering, questioning, asking…..it's the look he gets now, everywhere he goes where people know the story. They're thinking about her, and about her death, and feeling sorry for him, _oh, look, there's Michael Vaughn, oh, didn't you hear? His wife died recently, such a tragedy_, and it's moments like that when he just wants to scream, because they didn't know her, didn't know that this was the second time he'd bury her…..they just _didn't __know._

He had scooped up Katie in his arms, and she'd burrowed into his embrace, her two little brown braids stroking the side of his face. And then she'd looked at him, those big green eyes staring into his face, and she'd asked him the question that he'd been waiting for.

"Daddy, where's Mommy?"

There had been tears rolling down his face, but he'd tried to blink them back for her sake, because she had told him to be strong for their daughter, and she didn't need him going to pieces on her at that moment.

"Mommy's gone to be an angel, sweetheart. She's gone to be with God."

Those words are etched into the hard drive of his brain, and he will hear them every day for the rest of his life. 

He doesn't know if they were the right words to say, but they were all he could say.

"I want Mommy," she had cried, and he would have given up everything he owned only to make her stop crying.

"I know, sweetheart, I know," he had cried himself, "I want her too."

They're burying her today, but he won't speak at her funeral. Couldn't speak.

The job will go to her father, who spoke last time, and he perversely wonders whether or not Jack will reuse his speech.

They buried Dixon yesterday, and his kids had been there as well, nearly all grown up, with their aunt and uncle, whom they're going to be living with. 

To an outside observer, to someone who'd never known death, they looked like they were fine.

They looked like they were strong, like they'd cope.

He looked at their eyes, because a person's eyes never lie, and he could see the pain that only comes from losing both your parents within ten years of one another. They'd cope, he knew, because there was no alternative. Nothing else to do but to keep on living, day in and day out until gradually you could eat and breathe and sleep again without seeing ghosts imprinted on the back of your retinas.

They'd cope.

Just as he's coping, by living each day as it came, by praying, almost constantly when he's not with Katie, seeking the hope and faith and peace that comes only from his prayers. His faith is almost stronger than before, because he needs to know that she's somewhere better, somewhere where she's waiting for him. 

Days are all right for him. Days are days with Katie, spent trying to make her happy, trying to stop her from crying for her Mommy, even when there are times sometimes [_there are always times_] when he just wants to let it all go and join her in her tears. He'd never thought that she wouldn't understand it, because she's too smart a little girl, even at her age, to not understand the concept of death. She understands it too well, he thinks sometimes, but then he thinks about how close he's come to death in his life, and about the dance that her mother had played with death, and he thinks that maybe a close understanding of death is hereditary. 

Days are all right for him.

Nights – nights are harder. Nights are spent listening to Katie cry out for her mother as she lies in the bed next to him because she's too scared to sleep in her own room, spent lying awake staring at the ceiling, craving her presence, missing her warmth in the bed that they shared so long.  Nights are spent with Katie, cradling her as she wakes from nightmares, every night, night in night out, kissing her tears away and telling her that her mother was a hero, died a hero, died protecting her friends and the people she loved, and desperately trying not to look into her eyes because he knows he'll see the question, _Daddy why couldn't you protect Mommy? Because he doesn't have an answer for her, probably never will. But it's not so much guilt he feels as gut-wrenching pain and grief and anguish and…__achinglongingpainneedwant._

He misses her more at night.

But he'll cope. 

_He has to._

He's done this once before. 

He'll survive.

_He has to._

He'll live.

_He has to._

_She told him to_.

  
  



	15. b ii 2 Belief

**AUTHOR'S NOTES**: Well, we've nearly reached the end of this little exploration of alternate realities and the inside of Vaughn's head; I hope you've enjoyed reading it as much as I've enjoyed writing it. You've been an amazing group of readers, and your feedback has inspired me in so many ways. So thankyou so much!  
  
Special thanks must go out to **bailsgal**, **Patricia**, and **aliaschick4mv**, otherwise known as Elle, who have just been the most incredible supporters of me throughout this fic and other fics, along with so many others [**angvau57** [Angela] and **freedoms** are just two who spring to mind.]  
  
More A/Ns at the end; just bear in mind that for the purposes of this fic, Vaughn's mother died before Season 1.   
  
_b)ii)2 Belief_  
  
It's been thirty years since they finally brought down Sloane, over forty since they met.  
  
Their children are adults now, or close enough to it, and they've even got their very first grandchildren, two little girls who are doted on as much as possible by her very proud grandparents. They've been enjoying their retirement for a few years now, but they're still busy people, because, really, they were never meant to be idle.   
  
It's Christmas time, and they've all come home for the holidays, to the house they moved to when all their babies had finally flown out of the nest a few years before.  
They've finally moved out of California, although not too far. They live in Idaho, outside a small town called Ketchum near a ski resort named Sun Valley, and it's ruggedly beautiful and hot in summer, and idyllically pretty and cold in winter.   
  
They have a lovely house, not too big but not too small either, on a sizeable piece of land which is really a little big for them at their age, but it gives them a lot of room for their dogs and Katie's horses, which she keeps on their property because trying to find enough room to keep horses in New York is a near impossible task unless you've got a few million to spare.  
  
She never had outgrown that obsession with horses, he chuckles, remembering days when his hair was a little less streaked with grey [or, really, he admits, a little less _white_], and his back a little more able to cope with giving piggyback rides around the house.  
  
She'd been joined by a sister, Sophie, when she was four years old, and a brother, Adam five years later, when she was nine and Sophie five.   
Katie's thirty-five now, and is married and lives in New York with twin daughters of her own. Sydney had been nearly right all those years before when she'd said that her daughter would become a literature professor like she had once aspired; Katie, not content to merely study other people's work, had become an author, and her third novel was due out early in the next year.   
  
Sophie is thirty-one, and although there's no sight of a husband or any children, she's happily single and still living in LA, working as a doctor. She's the spitting image of him, with his sandy-blonde hair and green eyes, and she's every bit as passionate about doing the right thing as he was at her age. He just hopes that she'll never lose that passion, as he had come so close to doing in later years.  
  
Adam is twenty-six now, and is working on a law degree at Yale, Vaughn's alma mater. Adam wants to join the CIA after he graduates, a possibility that both thrills and scares him – he's so incredibly proud of his son wanting to serve his country in the same way he and his wife did, but at the same time he can't help being afraid for him knowing the sort of things he had faced in the Agency. His son doesn't look like Sydney or Vaughn, but anyone who has seen pictures of Jack Bristow and William Vaughn at the same age can see the family resemblance.   
He can't resist being proud of his three beautiful, talented children, although he knows he's more than a little biased, of course.  
  
And as for Sydney? Well, Sydney is every bit as beautiful in his eyes as she was the day he met her, and practically unchanged, except for a few more wrinkles and a little bit more grey in her hair.  
  
And she still calls him Vaughn, he thinks with a grin, having given up trying to persuade her to call him Mike or at very least Michael many, many years before.   
  
Her mother had died about twenty years ago, from breast cancer. He remembers watching her fade away, withered and made frail by the chemo, her long hair falling out and then being replaced by a wig. The hardest part of seeing Irina Derevko die, though, for him, was trying to accept that someone so strong could die from something as insidious as cancer.   
  
Jack had died almost exactly a year later, of a broken heart, he'd always thought. He'd never been quite as scared of Jack as he had been seeing him after Irina's death, his slow, continuous disintegration so that the once powerful, confident CIA agent that he'd been so accustomed to seeing was nothing more than a broken old man who grieved for his wife desperately.  
  
Sydney….Sydney had, quite understandably, taken her parents' deaths badly. He sighs, remembering the depression she had slipped into after her father's death, and the nights spent holding her in his arms as she cried herself to sleep. And even now, nearly twenty years after they died….he still sees her grief around the time of their deaths.  
  
It will be Christmas Eve tomorrow, the nineteenth anniversary of the day when Jack Bristow fell asleep one night and just….didn't wake up the next morning. It hadn't really come as much of a surprise, really, because they'd all been worried about him, all watched him carefully to make sure he still ate and drank regularly, all known that the end was surely near…..but still, the shock and pain of finding him sleeping one morning, unable to be woken….well, that pain still lingers with all of them, but with Sydney most of all.  
  
But it's still Christmas Eve, and all their children [_and grandchildren_] are here with them to celebrate the holidays.  
  
And so he watches the gates to their property swing open in the distance, and Syd's SUV, which she insists on driving still, despite its antiquity, comes roaring up the drive.   
  
He shudders briefly as he remembers countless other trips with his wife, who he does love dearly, down that very drive.  
  
Whatever age has changed about Sydney Vaughn….one thing remains the same, even now.  
  
_Her driving._  
  
"Pop!"  
  
"Popppppy!"  
  
He winces slightly, hearing his granddaughters' rather piercing voices. He turns in the direction of the shouts, only to be bombarded by flying tackle hugs to his legs by two rather hyperactive five year old twin girls, his first grandchildren, named for their great grandmothers on their mothers' side, Laura and Marguerite, which, being a rather stuffy name for a five year old, is usually shortened to Meg.   
  
"Well, look at how you two have grown!" he says, trying to disentangle the two girls from his legs. And grown they have, he thinks with a fond grin. Meg, who looks almost exactly like her mother, is brown-haired and green-eyed, and has surely grown at least four inches since the last time he saw them, and Laura, blond-haired and blue-eyed like her father, at least that much, if not more.  
  
"Hi, Mike," calls his son-in-law, Jack Malone.   
  
"Hi, Jack," he replies, walking down the stairs of the front porch, "Let me give you a hand with your bags, won't you?"   
  
"Nah, I'm fine, but thanks," Jack replies, shaking hands with him.  
  
His daughter hops out of the car then, and exclaims, "Dad!"  
  
"Hello, sweetheart," he replies, hugging her warmly. She may be thirty-five, and older than he was when he had met her mother….but she's still as energetic as she was as a toddler…and, he thinks with a shudder, as a teenager. "You look wonderful. How was your trip?"  
  
She shrugs before answering. "You've been on one plane, you've been on them all, really. The girls had fun though, didn't you, darlings?" She reaches out and ruffles Meg's hair affectionately as they play a game which involves a great deal of giggling and running with their border collies, Burns and Smithers.  
  
He watches with amusement as they ignore their mother's question, instead choosing to chase off down one side of the house with the two dogs, skipping excitedly towards the room at the back of the house that they always stay in when they come to visit.  
  
He watches Katie sigh exhaustedly, but he has absolutely no sympathy for her whatsoever.   
  
"You know who they remind me off at this age?" he says, a grin creeping across his face.  
  
"Daddd…..I can't have been _that_ bad."  
  
"No, you were worse," agrees his wife, coming up behind him from the house. Somehow, he concludes, she must have snuck into the house with some of Katie and Jack's bags and doubled back to sneak up on him.  
  
"But…_twins_. What did I do to deserve it?"  
  
"You married a man whose mother had a twin, and who has two sets of twin sisters," chuckled Jack, kissing Katie on the cheek as he grabbed more bags from the trunk of the car.  
  
"Still….I swear, they just never stop. And they _never_ sleep."  
  
He starts to laugh at this, remembering years of being woken before dawn by an overly exuberant daughter bouncing onto their bed at disgustingly early hours.  
  
"Something funny, Dad?" His daughter asks, with a hint of irritability in her voice.  
  
"Not really….I'm just remembering how many mornings of mine you disturbed by cannonballing onto my stomach at 6am," he says through his laughter.  
  
"Hmph," she pouts. "When are Sophie and Adam getting here?"  
  
"Well, that was a sudden change of subject," Sydney remarks with a grin. "Conceding defeat are we, Katie dear?"  
  
"I know when I've lost a battle," his daughter replies, with an aloof expression on her face.  
  
"Smart girl," he says, leaning in to kiss her on the forehead. "Your brother and sister will be here…when, Syd?"  
  
"They should both be at Salt Lake City Airport….now," she says, checking her watch. "Meaning that their flight should be leaving in about two hours, so they'll be here…oh, by 3pm? And Vaughn, you're doing this run, okay? I've had more than enough of Ketchum Airport for one day."  
  
"Okay, sweetheart," he says, picking up one of Jack and Katie's bags and carrying it inside.  
  
*  
  
"Daddy!"  
  
_That_ would be his daughter, he thinks with a smile, who, while not so constantly hyperactive as her older sister, has always managed to make herself heard in a crowd, which, he thought, looking around the airport with a frown, was certainly what he was in.  
  
"Sophie, what on earth have you done to your hair?" he manages to gasp out, as he catches sight of her properly.  
  
It's red.  
  
And blue.  
  
_Fluoro_ red and blue. In dreadlocks.  
  
"Do you like it, Dad?"  
  
"Um," he chokes out, "It's interesting."  
  
She moves forward to hug him, and all he can think of is that his daughter's hairstyle is just about the only hairstyle he's ever seen that could possibly begin to rival some of the wigs his wife had worn in her years with SD-6.   
  
And then he just begins to hope that his son hasn't done something similarly interesting with his hair, although he's pretty sure that his rather strait-laced son wouldn't show up for Christmas with his family with a hairstyle that resembles the American flag.  
  
Or so he hopes.  
  
He breathes a sigh of relief as he catches sight of his son pushing through the crowd.  
  
He hasn't done anything with his hair….although, he seems to have attached himself to a rather beautiful young blonde.   
  
"Hi, Dad."  
  
"Hello, Adam," he says, raising an eyebrow at his youngest child. "Is there someone you'd like to introduce me to?"  
  
"Um, yeah," says his son rather sheepishly.  
  
"Dad, this is Eleanor Lawley….my fiancée."  
  
"Oh," he says, wondering whether or not any other members of his family had anything else likely to cause a heart attack to show him or tell him today. Because he'd really appreciate them getting all the surprises over and done with, really.  
  
"Elle, this is my father."  
  
"It's a pleasure, Elle," he says smiling at the young woman, who's obviously rather intimidated by meeting her future father-in-law.  
  
"It's wonderful to finally meet you, Mr. Vaughn. Adam's told me so much about you!"  
  
"Please. My name's Michael, or Mike. And welcome to the family. Now, can I help you with your bags?"  
  
"Oh, I'm fine thanks," she says, wheeling her bags behind her.  
  
"All right then. If no one else wants to give me a heart attack today, then the car is right this way."  
  
All three of them grin, and follow him out of the crowded airport and into the carpark.  
  
He can't _wait_ to see Sydney's reaction to their daughter's new hairstyle…and their son's unexpected companion.  
  
*  
  
"Sophie, what _have_ you done to your hair?"   
  
He's content to just watch this one play out, really, seeing the look on his wife's face – and the one on his daughter's. _This could really be quite interesting_, he thinks with an amused grin.  
  
"Nevermind," Sydney says, and he deflates inside. He'd really been looking forward to seeing how loud she'd get in her reaction to Sophie's rather interesting haircut, and he's almost tempted to pout like Katie had done earlier that afternoon. _No fun_.  
  
And then he realises exactly how old he is….and it's really a quite depressing number that he won't bother dwelling on for any longer than he really has to. _Thank goodness that medical technology has improved in the last forty or so years…_  
  
His wife's voice snaps him back into reality and away from dwelling on his age, thankfully.  
  
"Elle! Hello! So nice to meet you. Adam, go help Elle with her bags," she says, a smile plastered on her face. As his son walks past her, however, he sees her very discreetly pull him aside and say, "We'll talk about this later, young man."  
  
"Yes, Mom," his son replies submissively. As Adam walks past him with Elle's bags, he shoots a pleading '_please get me out of the doghouse Dad_' look to him, and he resists the urge to grin. His son really has made his own bed here…and he's tempted to just let him lie in it for a bit longer. But, after all, it's Christmas, and he'd may as well talk to his wife about it.  
  
"Syd, do you really think that was fair?"  
  
"What? Oh, sorry, Vaughn," replies his wife, snapping out of her own little reverie and turning around to face him.  
  
"I mean, I can kind of understand him not wanting to tell us about something like this over the phone…"  
  
"Oh, I'm not really annoyed about that. Remember how long it took for us to tell my Dad that we were getting married?"  
  
He winces; that wasn't really a period of time he was all that interested in reliving. Really. The less amount of time spent dwelling on the circumstances of his proposal, the better.  
  
"I thought as much. It's just that he could have at least told us he was bringing someone…"  
  
"I suppose," he concedes. "She seems like a very nice girl, though. And they obviously get along well."  
  
"Oh, yes. They remind me of us, a little, especially all the longing looks and significant touches, especially," she adds with a smirk.  
  
"Do you need any help with dinner?" he offers, aware of how stressed cooking for so many makes her.  
  
"No, it's fine. The girls have already offered to come and help me out."  
  
"Good," he says, kissing her on the cheek before adding with a grin, "Then I can go and watch the game without feeling guilty."  
  
She whacks him playfully on the arm, and he really doesn't think that age has changed them very much at all, really. It certainly hasn't calmed them down much…or made them any less crazy about each other.  
  
*  
  
They all sit around the dinner table that night, and he just watches, watches them all talk, and laugh, and squeal [in Meg and Laura's case].  
  
And he can't get over how lucky he is.  
  
Some men may say that their lives are better than his.  
  
They may say that they're happier because they earn more money.   
  
Or because they have had easier lives.  
  
He's not a millionaire.  
  
They're comfortable, but not rich.  
  
It doesn't bother them that much, though, because they have each other, and that's all they've ever needed.  
  
There's a favourite passage from the Bible he knows very well. _Man cannot live on bread alone._  
  
No, he thinks, as he looks at everything _he_ lives on, he doesn't live on bread alone.  
  
He lives on love, and trust, and hope, and laughter, and faith.  
  
He has his family and his faith, and he's happy.  
  
And it's all he needs to get by.  
  
"What's up with you tonight, Vaughn?" Syd asks him with a smile. "You've been staring off into space all night."  
  
"Oh, I was just thinking."  
  
"Well, that's dangerous."  
  
He sees his children repress smirks, and he can't help but grin himself. "Yeah, tell me about it."  
  
He looks at his children, and his grandchildren, and his wife, and he says, quite seriously.   
  
"Don't let anyone ever tell you that money or fame or success can make you happy. And never let anyone tell you that _anything_ is more important than love. I know you probably think that I'm just a rambling old man, and that I'm a bit off my rocker," he laughs now before continuing, "I know I probably would have if my father had ever told me something like this….but when you're my age, you'll realise the importance of all these things."  
  
He's not sure whether or not they understand what he's saying, or whether or not they do think that it's anything but the ramblings of an old man…but in some ways it doesn't matter.  
  
Those who understand will understand, even if it takes them awhile.  
  
And somehow he thinks that his family understands.  
  
But as he looks into the eyes of his wife, he _knows_ that she does.  
  
And that's all that matters.  
  
_The most important thing you'll ever learn, is just to love, and be loved in return._  
  
*  
  
He knows that there will come a day when one of them will go to sleep and just not wake up.  
  
He knows that the other one will cry, and weep, but at the end of the tears they'll smile again, because they know that they'll see each other again.  
  
And then one day, they'll go to sleep, and just not wake up.  
  
But it doesn't matter.  
  
Death doesn't scare them.  
  
Because when they say farewell, it's only goodnight, not goodbye.  
  
_After all, to the well-organized mind, death is but the next great adventure._  
  
And death cannot stop true love…all it can do is delay it for a while.  
  
_This he knows.  
  
This he **believes. **_  
  
*  
  
  
  
Okay, quotes from "Moulin Rouge", "A Princess Bride" and "Harry Potter and the Philosopher's/Sorcerer's Stone" all scattered in there.   
  
I'll be back with more author's notes after "Alias" airs here, okay?  
  
ETA: Well, I actually didn't write as much angst in this chapter as I could have; it was rather surprisingly fluffy, actually. Hehehe. Fluff is fun to write. And I really hope that my two best friends don't mind me stealing their first and last names for Adam's fiancee. And even if they do, there's really not much they can do about it.   
  
And any "Without a Trace" fans who thought the name of Katie's husband was weird...yeah, blame watching way too many WaT clips on that one. Even though this Jack Malone looks nothing like the show's one.   
  
  
Em


	16. Endings

And just when you thought it was all over........here's the conclusion.  
  
The Word document that this story is in is titled "Endings", which was the original title for this story.  
  
Therefore I really thought that there was no better title for the epilogue to this story than it's original title.  
  
Here it is; the 16th, and last part of this story. Enjoy.   
  
It's only short, but I quite enjoyed writing it; I've never written in future tense before, but I think it's strangely fitting.  
  
**Dedication: To everyone who's reviewed. I write as a form of catharsis, but it's your feedback that makes it worth it. **  
  
_Endings_  
  
These are the ways in which it might end:  
  
He will stay with Lauren.  
  
And he'll be happy.  
  
She will die on a mission, driven near-suicidal by the way in which he will have moved on.  
  
He will grieve.  
  
But he will know that he could have prevented it.  
  
_Or_  
  
She will marry his best friend.  
  
They'll be very happy.  
  
But he'll never be able to move on in the way in which he has.  
  
He'll love her forever.  
  
_Or  
_  
He will stay with Lauren.  
  
They'll be happy for awhile.  
  
But in the end it won't last, and they'll be driven apart by words said in anger that they won't really mean.  
  
He'll ring her four years after he abandoned her, and he'll say, "Joey's Pizza."  
  
She'll take him back, and then he'll tell her that he loves her.  
  
And it'll all be all right, in the end.  
  
_Or_  
  
She'll have moved on.  
  
She'll be married.  
  
She'll tell him that she loved him. That she'll always love him.  
  
But it won't be enough.  
  
And he'll be alone in the end, wondering what if.  
  
_Or_  
  
He will call her.  
  
She will be standing behind him.  
  
She will tell him that she fell in love with him on this pier.  
  
He'll tell her that he can't deny that he loves his wife. Because he does.  
  
But not the way he loves her.   
  
He will tell her that she makes him complete.  
  
And then he will tell her that he wants it to work.  
  
There will be a day when he catches her on his laptop.  
  
There will be a day when he pins her to the fridge, not out of passion but out of fear and anger and betrayal.  
  
There will be a day when she tells him that she has to leave, that she has to find her parents.  
  
That she has to find out why there's a hole in her mind.  
  
_Or_  
  
She will already be dead.  
  
The woman that he has loved for the past six months will be a double.  
  
She will tell him that emotions only get you killed.  
  
And then –  
  
Then  
  
She  
  
Will  
  
Kill   
  
Him.  
  
But he won't care, because he'll get to be with her again.  
  
_Or_  
  
They will marry six years to the day after they met.  
  
They will have a daughter at first, a brilliant little girl called Katie.  
  
They will never have a fairytale life.  
  
But somehow he will think that he is living happily ever after.  
  
One day they will be called in by Kendall, and told that they can finally take down Sloane.  
  
He will lead the mission, and she will insist on taking part.  
  
It will be a trap.  
  
Sloane will demand her as a hostage in exchange for letting the rest of them go.  
  
She will tell him that she's not afraid.  
  
He will believe her, because she's the most courageous person he's ever met.  
  
She will nearly go with Sloane.  
  
She will be saved by Marcus Dixon.  
  
But not before she is killed.  
  
She will tell him he has to be strong for her, for their daughter.  
  
He will pick up their daughter and let her sob on his chest, asking where her Mommy is.  
  
He will tell her that she's gone to heaven.  
  
He will be better this time.  
  
It won't hurt so much this time.   
  
Because he knows he'll see her again.  
  
And because he will know he can't afford to let himself go this time.  
  
Because he will know he has to be strong for Katie.  
  
And so he will.  
  
_Or_  
  
They will take down Sloane easily.  
  
Katie will be joined by Sophie and Adam in time.  
  
They will move out of LA, to a small country town.  
  
They will grow old together, surrounded by family and friends.  
  
He will, one day, go to sleep and not wake up.  
  
Or maybe she'll be the first to go.  
  
Either way, it doesn't really matter which order they go.  
  
They'll be together in the end.  
  
And they'll know that love is the only thing in this world that really matters.  
  
.  
  
These are not the only ways it might end.  
  
But it will end somehow.  
  
He will be with Lauren.  
  
He will be with his family.  
  
He will be with her.  
  
He will be alone.  
  
He will be alone again.  
  
He will be killed by a woman wearing her face.  
  
He will be with his daughter.  
  
He will be with her.  
  
It will end.  
  
None of the choices he will make as he will sit on this pier will change that.  
  
_Death comes to all men._  
  
The only things that his choices can change are the way in which he will live, and the way in which he will die.  
  
And so he will call a number, and in this world he will call a brown-haired woman.  
  
In another he will call a blonde-haired woman.  
  
In another still he might call his best friend, or make no phone call at all.  
  
We will not know how it will end.  
  
Just that it will.  
  
*  
  
_finis_  
  
  
  
Um. Yeah. There's the fic. 22,393 words, and 59 pages of looking inside of Vaughn's head. Anyone tired now?   
  
  
It's been a pleasure to write for you, and I thank you for all the wonderful reviews.   
  
  
Em


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